From Semiconductors To Proteins Beyond The Average Structure

From Semiconductors to Proteins: Beyond the Average Structure

This series of books, which is published at the rate of about one per year, addresses fundamental problems in materials science. The contents cover a broad range of topics from small clusters of atoms to engineering materials and involve chemistry, physics, materials science, and engineering, with length scales ranging from Angstroms up to millimeters. The emphasis is on basic science rather than on applications. Each book focuses on a single area of current interest and brings together leading experts to give an up-to-date discussion of their work and the work of others. Each article contains enough references that the interested reader can access the relevant literature. Thanks are given to the Center for Fundamental Materials Research at Michigan State University for supporting this series. M.F. Thorpe, Series Editor E-mail: [email protected] East Lansing, Michigan, November 200 I v PREFACE The study of the atomic structure of crystalline materials began at the beginning of the twentieth century with the discovery by Max von Laue and by W.H. and W.L. Bragg that crystals diffract x-rays. At that time, even the existence of atoms was controversial.

Characterization of Semiconductor Heterostructures and Nanostructures

Characterization of Semiconductor Heterostructures and Nanostructures is structured so that each chapter is devoted to a specific characterization technique used in the understanding of the properties (structural, physical, chemical, electrical etc..) of semiconductor quantum wells and superlattices. An additional chapter is devoted to ab initio modeling. The book has two basic aims. The first is educational, providing the basic concepts of each of the selected techniques with an approach understandable by advanced students in Physics, Chemistry, Material Science, Engineering, Nanotechnology. The second aim is to provide a selected set of examples from the recent literature of the TOP results obtained with the specific technique in understanding the properties of semiconductor heterostructures and nanostructures. Each chapter has this double structure: the first part devoted to explain the basic concepts, and the second to the discussion of the most peculiar and innovative examples. The topic of quantum wells, wires and dots should be seen as a pretext of applying top level characterization techniques in understanding the structural, electronic etc properties of matter at the nanometer (and even sub-nanometer) scale. In this respect it is an essential reference in the much broader, and extremely hot, field of Nanotechnology. Comprehensive collection of the most powerful characterization techniques for semiconductors heterostructures and nanostructures Most of the chapters are authored by scientists that are world-wide among the top-ten in publication ranking of the specific field Each chapter starts with a didactic introduction on the technique The second part of each chapters deals with a selection of top examples highlighting the power of the specific technique to analyse the properties of semiconductors heterostructures and nanostructures

Characterization of Semiconductor Heterostructures and Nanostructures