On how differently the quasi-harmonic approximation works for two isostructural crystals: thermal properties of periclase and lime.

Harmonic and quasi-harmonic thermal properties of two isostructural simple oxides (periclase, MgO, and lime, CaO) are computed with ab initio periodic simulations based on the density-functional-theory (DFT). The more polarizable character of calcium with respect to magnesium cations is found to dramatically affect the validity domain of the quasi-harmonic approximation that, for thermal structural properties (such as temperature dependence of volume, V(T), bulk modulus, K(T), and thermal expansion coefficient, α(T)), reduces from [0 K-1000 K] for MgO to just [0 K-100 K] for CaO. On the contrary, thermodynamic properties (such as entropy, S(T), and constant-volume specific heat, CV(T)) are described reliably at least up to 2000 K and quasi-harmonic constant-pressure specific heat, CP(T), up to about 1000 K in both cases. The effect of the adopted approximation to the exchange-correlation functional of the DFT is here explicitly investigated by considering five different expressions of three different classes (local-density approximation, generalized-gradient approximation, and hybrids). Computed harmonic thermodynamic properties are found to be almost independent of the adopted functional, whereas quasi-harmonic structural properties are more affected by the choice of the functional, with differences that increase as the system becomes softer.