Electron correlation effects on the d-d excitations in NiO

The partly filled 3d shell in solid transition metal compounds is quite localized on the transition metal ion and gives rise to large electron correlation effects. With the recently developed CASSCF/CASPT2 approach electron correlation effects can be accounted for efficiently. The CASSCF step accounts for the non-dynamical correlation and part of the dynamical correlation, the following CASPT2 step takes largely care of the remaining dynamical correlation in a perturbative way. This approach is applied to the d-d excitations in NiO for which both non-dynamical and dynamical electron correlation effects have substantial influence on the energy differences. Excitation energies that compare well to the experimental data are obtained and the importance of the different electron correlation effects can be assessed.