The magnetism of iron and other transition metals had been a subject of inten sive research for a long time, but the understanding of the microscopic origin of "metallic magnetism" was quite limited until the early 1970's. During the last 10 to 15 years both theory and experiment contributed towards signif icant progress in this field, such that today a qualitative understanding has been achieved. The word "qualitative" indicates that the knowledge is still not complete; although many properties, the ground state as well as the finite temperature behaviour and the phase transition from magnetic order at low temperatures to the paramagnetic state at high temperatures, can be explained in a coherent way, a quantitative description still is not fully achieved. It is certainly appropriate to summarize the developments of the last 15 years and the present-day understanding of the field, this is the aim of this Topics volume. The form chosen is a collection of reviews, written by prominent scientists who themselves contributed decisively to the progress. Scientists with a general interest in the field as well as specialists and active researchers in metallic magnetism should be able to profit from the two-volume treatment. The subjects not covered extensively in the present first volume (in particular neutron scattering and electronic structure properties) will make up the second volume.

Inhalt

1. Introduction.- 1.1 Preliminary Remarks.- 1.2 Ground State and Elementary Excitations.- 1.3 Finite Temperature Properties: What Drives the Phase Transition?.- 1.4 The Paramagnetic Phase.- 1.5 Organization of the Book.- References.- 2. A Unified Picture of Magnetism.- 2.1 Background.- 2.2 Theory of Magnetism Based on the Band Model.- 2.3 Self-Consistent Renormalization Theory for the Coupled Extended Modes of Spin Fluctuations.- 2.4 A Unified Description of Magnetism Adiabatic Approximation.- 2.5 Dynamical Properties of Spin Fluctuations.- 2.6 Conclusion.- References.- 3. 3d-Metallic Magnetism and Spin-Resolved Photoemission.- 3.1 Background.- 3.2 The Electronic Structure of Ferromagnets.- 3.3 Concepts of Spin- and Angle-Resolved Photoemission from Ferromagnets.- 3.4 Apparatus for Spin- and Angle-Resolved Photoemission.- 3.5 The Electronic Structure of Ni and Fe at Low Temperatures.- 3.6 Resonant Photoemission and Auger Electrons.- 3.7 Secondary Electron Spin Polarization and Stoner Excitations.- 3.8 Finite Temperature Ferromagnetism and Photoemission.- 3.9 Concluding Remarks and Outlook.- References.- 4. The Local-Band Theory.- 4.1 Background.- 4.2 Single-Particle States and Energies.- 4.3 Green's Functions.- 4.4 Green's Functions Revisited: The Rotated Frame.- 4.5 Model Analysis.- 4.6 Conclusion.- 4. A Appendix.- References.- 5. Electron Correlations in Transition Metals.- 5.1 Background.- 5.2 The Correlated Ground State.- 5.3 Correlation Effects in Single-Particle Excitations.- 5.4 Finite Temperature Calculations.- 5.5 Influence of Correlations on the Photoelectron Spectra from Inner-Core States.- References.- 6. Magnetovolume Effects.- 6.1 Physical Mechanisms.- 6.2 Experimental Results.- References.- Additional References with Titles.