A lucid account of the fundamental physics of all types of microclusters, outlining the dynamics and static properties of this new phase of matter between a solid and a molecule. Since the book's first publication, the field of microclusters has experienced surprising developments, which are reviewed in this new edition: The determination of atomic structure, spontaneous alloying, super-shell, fission, fragmentation, evaporation, magnetism, fullerenes, nanotubes, atomic structure of large silicon clusters, superfluidity of a He cluster, water clusters in liquid, electron correlation and optimizsation of the geometry, and scattering.

On Friday, February 20, 1980, I had the pleasure to be present at the inaugural lecture of my colleague Jan Reedijk, who had just been named at the Chair of Inorganic Chemistry of Leiden University. According to tradition, the ceremony took place in the impressive Hall of the old University Academy Building. In the course of his lecture, Jan mentioned a number of recent developments in chemistry which had struck him as particularly important or interesting. Among those was the synthesis of large metal cluster compounds, and, to my luck, he showed a slide ofthe molecular structure of [PtI9(C)b]4-. (To my luck, since at traditional Leiden University it is quite unusual to show slides at such ceremonies.) This constituted my first acquaintance with this exciting new class of materials. I became immediately fascinated by this molecule, partly because of the esthetic beauty of its fivefold symmetry, partly because as a physicist it struck me that it could be visualized as an "embryonically small" metal particle, embedded in a shell of CO ligands.

Includes Annual reports for the Physics and Astronomy Departments.

Physics of New Materials After the discoveries and applications of superconductors, new ceramics, amorphous and nano-materials, shape memory and other intelligent materials, physics became more and more important, comparable with chemistry, in the research and development of advanced materials. In this book, several important fields of physics-oriented new-materials research and physical means of analyses are selected and their fundamental principles and methods are described in a simple and understandable way. It is suitable as a textbook for university materials science courses.

Annotation The proceedings of the July 1997 conference reflect the interdisciplinary nature of cluster science. Topics of the 63 papers include shell and supershell structure; optical response and related subjects; fission and evaporation; collisions and reactions; phase transition of structure and reaction; cluster impact on solids at low energies (2 parts: cluster activity on surface and material science); radio activity technology for cluster study; and cluster impact on solid surfaces at high energies. Introductory and summary talks are also included. No index. Annotation c. by Book News, Inc., Portland, Or.