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- Two electrons are put in a potential well of decreasing width. What happens to the mean distance of electrons?
I did some calculations for the ground state energy and wave function of a system of two electrons put in a finite-depth 2D potential well. Regardless of the shape of the potential well (square or circular), the expectation value of the electron-electron distance ##\langle r_{12}\rangle = \langle\psi_0 \left.\right|r_{12}\left|\right.\psi_0\rangle## first becomes smaller when the diameter of the well is decreased. But at some point it increases again. Is this because the two electrons "give up" trying to fit in the potential well when it's too narrow, or is it more likely that I haven't set up my diffusion monte carlo parameters properly?