Dense hydrogen plasma: Comparison between models

Static and dynamical properties of the dense hydrogen plasma ($\rho >~2.6{\mathrm{g}\mathrm{}\mathrm{cm}}^{\mathrm{-}3},$ $0.1<T<\mathrm{}5\mathrm{}\mathrm{eV}$) in the strongly coupled regime are compared through different numerical approaches. It is shown that simplified density-functional molecular-dynamics simulations (DFMD), without orbitals, such as Thomas-Fermi Dirac or Thomas-Fermi-Dirac-Weiszäcker simulations give similar results to more sophisticated descriptions such as Car-Parrinello (CP), tight binding, or path-integral Monte Carlo, in a wide range of temperatures. At very low temperature, screening effects predicted by DFMD are still less pronounced than CP simulations.