Assessing the Accuracy of Quantum Dynamics Performed in the Time-Dependent Basis Representation

A full quantum-mechanical (QM) description of large amplitude nuclear motion, associated with chemical reactions or isomerization of high-dimensional molecular systems, is inherently challenging due to the exponential scaling of the QM complexity with system size. To ameliorate the scaling bottleneck in studies of realistic systems, typically modeled in the configuration space, the nuclear wave functions are represented in terms of time-dependent basis functions. Such bases are expected to give an accurate description with a modest number of basis functions employed, by adapting them to the wave function solving the time-dependent Schrödinger equation. It is not, however, straightforward to estimate the accuracy of the resulting solution: in QM the energy conservation, a convenient such measure for a classical trajectory evolving in a time-independent potential, is not a sufficient criterion of the dynamics' accuracy. In this work, we argue that the expectation value of the Hamiltonian's "variance", quantifying the basis completeness, is a suitable practical measure of the quantum dynamics' accuracy. Illustrations are given for several chemistry-relevant test systems, modeled employing time-independent as well as time-dependent bases, including the coupled and variational coherent states methods and the quantum-trajectory guided adaptable Gaussians (QTAG) as the latter basis type. A novel semilocal definition of the QTAG basis time-evolution for placing the basis functions "in the right place at the right time" is also presented.