A collisional extension of time-dependent Hartree–Fock

We propose a collisional extension of time-dependent mean-field theories on the basis of a recently proposed stochastic extension of mean-field dynamics (stochastic time-dependent Hartree–Fock, STDHF). The latter theory is unfortunately too involved to envision practical applications in realistic systems in the near future and is thus bound to model systems. It is also hard to explore moderate to low energies with STDHF, because of vanishing transition probabilities that are impossible to sample properly. For such moderately excited situations covering small fluctuations, we compactify sampling by employing the same average mean field for all STDHF trajectories. The new approach, coined average STDHF (ASTDHF), ignores the fluctuations of the mean field but still accounts correctly for the collisional correlations responsible for dissipative features on top of mean-field dynamics. We detail the main features of the new approach in relation to existing equations, in particular quantum kinetic theories. The new theory is directly connected to STDHF, both formally and practically. We thus discuss in detail how the two approaches are related to each other. We apply the new scheme to illustrative examples taking as benchmark STDHF dynamics in 1D. ASTDHF provides results that are in remarkable agreement with the more elaborate STDHF. It makes it a promising approach to deal with dissipative dynamics in finite quantum systems, because of its moderate cost allowing applications in realistic systems and the possibility of exploring any excitation energy range where collisional correlations are expected to play a role. (paper)