  The band structure of silicon is calculated at the Gamma, X, and L wave
vectors using diffusion quantum Monte Carlo methods. Excited states are formed
by promoting an electron from the valence band into the conduction band. We
obtain good agreement with experiment for states around the gap region and
demonstrate that the method works equally well for direct and indirect
excitations, and that one can calculate many excited states at each wave
vector. This work establishes the fixed-node DMC approach as an accurate method
for calculating the energies of low lying excitations in solids.
