Energy density functionals (EDF) have become a standard tool for nuclear structure calculations, providing a complete and accurate, global description of nuclear ground states and collective excitations. Guided by the density dependence of nucleon self-energies in nuclear matter, semi-empirical functionals have been adjusted to the equation of state and to bulk properties of finite nuclei, and applied to studies of arbitrarily heavy nuclei, exotic nuclei far from stability, and even systems at the nucleon drip-lines.

EDF-based structure models have also been developed that go beyond the static mean-field approximation, and include collective correlations related to restoration of broken symmetries and to fluctuations of collective variables. These models are employed in analyses of structure phenomena  related to shell evolution, including detailed predictions of excitation spectra and electromagnetic transition rates.