Table 1.

Comparisons of free-electron density (n_e), average ionization $Z_{Cu}^{*}$ and 2p-population (f_2p) of Cu in warm-/hot-dense plasmas

Models	kT = 200 eV			kT = 300 eV
	ne (cm−3)	${\mathit{Z}}_{\mathit{Cu}}^{*}$	f2p	ne (cm−3)	${\mathit{Z}}_{\mathit{Cu}}^{*}$	f2p
ATBASE + Stewart–Pyatt (Spect3D)	5.1 × 1024	13.76	6.00	5.5 × 1024	15.78	5.93
SCRAM + ion-sphere	5.1 × 1024	14.39	5.84	5.5 × 1024	16.37	5.25
DFT + QMD (VERITAS)	5.0 × 1024	12.88	5.87	5.3 × 1024	14.96	5.27
DFT + AA (Muze)	5.0 × 1024	12.52	5.87	5.5 × 1024	14.43	5.24
FAC + AA (FAC)	4.2 × 1024	12.86	5.87	4.9 × 1024	15.19	5.19

The CHCu[2%] plasma mixture has a mass density of ρ = 20 g cm⁻³ and two different temperatures. These results are predicted from different atomic physics models. Comparisons of these predicted physical quantities demonstrate the differences between two categories of atomic physics models for warm- or hot-dense plasmas: DFT-based models vs. traditional collisional-radiative models. The quoted value of $Z_{Cu}^{*}$ for VERITAS was calculated from the Thomas–Fermi average-atom model to provide a comparison to the other models, even though DFT calculations do not need to define $Z_{Cu}^{*}$. Additional details of these models can be found in the Methods section.