Comparison between different computational schemes for variational calculations in nuclear structure

We compare several iteration methods for angular-momentum- and parity-projected Hartree-Fock calculations. We used the Anderson update, the modified Broyden method, newly introduced in nuclear-structure calculations, and variants of the Broyden-Fletcher-Goldhaber-Shanno methods (BFGS). We performed ground-state calculations for 18C and 6Li using the two-body Hamiltonian obtained from the CDBonn-2000 potential via the Lee-Suzuki renormalization method. We found that BFGS methods are superior to both the Anderson update and to the modified Broyden method. In the case of 6Li we found that the Anderson update and modified Broyden method do not converge to the angular-momentum- and parity-projected Hartree-Fock minimum. The reason is traced back to the lack of a mechanism that guarantees a decrease of the energy from one iteration to the next and to the fact that these methods guarantee a stationary solution rather than a minimum of the energy