Advances in nanoscale science show that the properties of many materials are dominated by internal structures. In molecular cases, such as window glass and proteins, these internal structures obviously have a network character. However, in many partly disordered electronic materials, almost all attempts at understanding are based on traditional continuum models. This workshop focuses first on the phase diagrams and phase transitions of materials known to be composed of molecular networks. These phase properties characteristically contain remarkable features, such as intermediate phases that lead to reversibility windows in glass transitions as functions of composition. These features arise as a result of self-organization of the internal structures of the intermediate phases. In the protein case, this self-organization is the basis for protein folding.
The second focus is on partly disordered electronic materials whose phase properties exhibit the same remarkable features. In fact, the phenomenon of High Temperature Superconductivity, discovered by Bednorz and Mueller in 1986, and now the subject of 75,000 research papers, also arises from such an intermediate phase. More recently discovered electronic phenomena, such as giant magnetoresistance, also are made possible only by the existence of such special phases.
This book gives an overview of the methods and results obtained so far by studying the characteristics and properties of nanoscale self-organized networks. It demonstrates the universality of the network approach over a range of disciplines, from protein folding to the newest electronic materials.

Inhalt

I. Some Mathematics. Mathematical Principles of Intermediate Phases in Disordered Systems; J.C. Phillips. Reduced Density Matrices and Correlation Matrix; A.J. Coleman. The Sixteen-Percent Solution: Critical Volume Fraction for Percolation; R. Zallen. The Intermediate Phase and Self-Organization in Network Glasses; M.F. Thorpe, M.V. Chubynsky. II. Glasses and Supercooled Liquids. Evidence for the Intermediate Phase in Chalcogenide Glasses; P. Boolchand, et al. Thermal Relaxation and Criticality of the Stiffness Transition; Y. Wang, et al. Solidity of Viscous Liquids; J.C. Dyre. Non-ERgodic Dynamics in Supercooled Liquids; M. Dzugutov, et al. Network Stiffening and Chemical Ordering in Chalcogenide Glasses: Compositional Trends of Tg in Relation to Structural Information from Solid and Liquid State NMR; C. Rosenhahn, et al. Glass Transition Temperature Variation as a Probe for Network Connectivity; M. Micoulaut. Floppy Modes Effects in the Thermodynamical Properties of Chalcogenide Glasses; G.G. Naumis. The Dalton-Maxwell-Pauling Recipe for Window Glass; R. Kerner. Local Bonding, Phase Stability and Interface Properties of Replacement Gate Dielectrics, Including Silicon Oxynitride Alloys and Nitrides, and Film Amphoteric' Elemental Oxides and Silicates; G. Lucovsky. Experimental Methods for Local Structure Determination on the Atomic Scale; E.A. Stern. Zeolite Instability and Collapse; G.N. Greaves. III. Metal-Insulator Transitions. Thermodynamics and Transport Properties of Interacting Systems with Localized Electrons; A.L. Efros. The Metal-Insulator Transition in Doped Semiconductors: Transport Properties and Critical Behaviour; T.G. Castner. Metal-Insulator Transition in Homogeneously Doped Germanium; M. Watanabe. IV. High Temperature Superconductors. Experimental Evidence for Ferroelastic Nanodomains in HTSC Cuprates and Related Oxides; J. Jung. Role of Sr Dopants in the Inhomogeneous Ground State of La2-xSrxCuO4; D. Haskel, et al. Universal Phase Diagrams and Ideal' High Temperature Superconductors: HgBa2CuO4+ ; J.L. Wagner, et al. Coexistence of Superconductivity and Weak Ferromagnetism in Eu1.5Ce0.5RuSr2Cu2O10; I. Felner. Quantum Percolation in High Tc Superconductors; V. Dallacasa. Superstripes: Self Organization of Quantum Wires in High Tc Superconductors; A. Bianconi, et al. Electron Strings in Oxides; F.V. Kusmartsev. High-Temperature Conductivity is Charge-Reservoir Superconductivity; J.D. Dow, et al. Electronic Inhomogeneities in High-Tc Superconductors Observed by NMR; J. Haase, et al. Tailoring the Properties of High-Tc and Related Oxides: From Fundamentals to Gap Nanoengineering; D. Pavuna. V. Self-Organization in Proteins. Designing Protein Structures; H. Li, et al. List of Participants. Index.