Based on an asymmetric Lanczos-chain subspace algorithm, damped coupled cluster linear response functions have been implemented for the hierarchy of coupled cluster (CC) models including CC with single excitations (CCS), CC2, CC with single and double excitations (CCSD), and CCSD with noniterative triple corrected excitation energies CCSDR(3). This work is a first step toward the extension of these theoretical electronic structure methods of well-established high accuracy in UV-vis absorption spectroscopies to applications concerned with x-ray radiation. From the imaginary part of the linear response function, the near K-edge x-ray absorption spectra of neon, water, and carbon monoxide are determined and compared with experiment. Results at the CCSD level show relative peak intensities in good agreement with experiment with discrepancies in transition energies due to incomplete treatment of electronic relaxation and correlation that amount to 1-2 eV. With inclusion of triple excitations, errors in energetics are less than 0.9 eV and thereby capturing 90%, 95%, and 98% of the relaxation-correlation energies for C, O, and Ne, respectively.

We present an implementation of the damped coupled-cluster linear response function based on an asymmetric Lanczos chain algorithm for the hierarchy of coupled-cluster approximations CCS (coupled-cluster singles), CC2 (coupled. cluster singles and approximate doubles), and CCSD (coupled-cluster singles and doubles). Triple corrections to the excitation energies can be included via the CCSDR(3) (coupled-cluster singles and doubles with noniterative-triples-corrected excitation energies) approximation. The performance and some of the potentialities of the approach are investigated in calculations of the visible/ultraviolet absorption spectrum and the dispersion of the real polarizability in near-resonant regions of pyrimidine, the near-edge absorption fine structure (NEXAFS) of ammonia, and the direct determination of the C-6 dipole-dipole dispersion coefficient of the benzene dimer.

Near carbon K-edge X-ray absorption fine structure spectra of a series of fluorine-substituted ethenes and acetone have been studied using coupled cluster and density functional theory (DFT) polarization propagator methods, as well as the static-exchange (STEX) approach. With the complex polarization propagator (CPP) implemented in coupled cluster theory, relaxation effects following the excitation of core electrons are accounted for in terms of electron correlation, enabling a systematic convergence of these effects with respect to electron excitations in the cluster operator. Coupled cluster results have been used as benchmarks for the assessment of propagator methods in DFT as well as the state-specific static-exchange approach. Calculations on ethene and 1,1-difluoroethene illustrate the possibility of using nonrelativistic coupled cluster singles and doubles (CCSD) with additional effects of electron correlation and relativity added as scalar shifts in energetics. It has been demonstrated that CPP spectra obtained with coupled cluster singles and approximate doubles (CC2), CCSD, and DFT (with a Coulomb attenuated exchange-correlation functional) yield excellent predictions of chemical shifts for vinylfluoride, 1,1-difluoroethene, trifluoroethene, as well as good spectral features for acetone in the case of CCSD and DFT. Following this, CPP-DFT is considered to be a viable option for the calculation of X-ray absorption spectra of larger pi-conjugated systems, and CC2 is deemed applicable for chemical shifts but not for studies of fine structure features. The CCSD method as well as the more approximate CC2 method are shown to yield spectral features relating to pi*-resonances in good agreement with experiment, not only for the aforementioned molecules but also for ethene, cis-1,2-difluoroethene, and tetrafluoroethene. The STEX approach is shown to underestimate pi*-peak separations due to spectral compressions, a characteristic which is inherent to this method.