HELIUM ATOM INSIDE BOXES WITH PARABOLOIDAL WALLS

The ground-state energy of the helium atom inside boxes with paraboloi dal walls, with the nucleus at the common focus, is calculated variati onally. The variational functions are products of geometry-adapted hyd rogenic functions, and the interelectronic Coulomb repulsion is repres ented through its harmonic expansion in parabolic coordinates. The ene rgy, pressure, quadrupole moment, and polarizability of the atom are d etermined as functions of the positions of the walls for symmetrical b oxes. (C) 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.