Finite-basis-set expansion methods for scattering problems

A wide variety of finite-basis-set expansion methods is applied to electron–hydrogen-atom scattering in the static-exchange approximation. All these methods are based on the Lippmann-Schwinger formalism. A careful analysis of the numerical results is presented with the aim of selecting efficient approaches to the solution of realistic electron-atom (and electron-molecule) scattering problems. The results show that the efficiency of the expansion methods may depend sensitively on the characteristics of the interaction terms. Some difficulties of the simple method of moments are pointed out. A particular least-squares method is proposed to avoid the spurious singularities encountered in applications of the Schwinger variational method to singlet scattering processes.