Ionization energy: sd transfer error and Perdew-Zunger self-interaction correction energy penalty in 3d atoms

To accurately describe the energetics of transition metal systems, density functional approximations (DFAs) must provide a balanced description of s- and d- electrons. One measure of this is the sd transfer error, which has previously been defined as E(3dⁿ⁻¹4s¹)−E(3dⁿ⁻²4s²). Theoretical concerns have been raised on the validity of these results owing to the evaluation of excited-state energies using ground-state DFAs. A more serious concern appears to be strong correlations in the 4s² configuration. Here we define a ground-state measure of the sd transfer error, based on the errors of s- and d-electron second ionization energies of the atoms, that effectively circumvents the aforementioned problems. We find an improved performance as we move from LSDA to PBE to r²SCAN for first-row transition metal atoms. However, we found large (~ 2 eV) ground-state sd transfer errors when applying a Perdew-Zunger self-interaction correction. This is attributed to an "energy penalty" associated with the noded 3d orbitals. A local scaling of the self-interaction correction to LSDA results in a cancellation of s- and d-errors.