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Meeting the long-felt need for in-depth information on one of the most advanced material characterization methods, a top team of editors and authors from highly prestigious facilities and institutions covers a range of synchrotron techniques that have proven useful for materials research. Following an introduction to synchrotron radiation and its sources, the second part goes on to describe the various techniques that benefit from this especially bright light, including X-ray absorption, diffraction, scattering, imaging, and lithography. The thrid and final part provides an overview of the applications of synchrotron radiation in materials science. bridging the gap between specialists in synchrotron research and material scientists, this is a unique and indispensable resource for academic and industrial researchers alike.

The 57 papers update the status of characterization techniques that use synchrotron radiation since the previous symposium on the subject in the spring of 1996. The techniques considered include X-ray absorption and scattering, imaging, tomography, microscopy, and topographic methods. Among the materials are surfaces, interfaces, electronic materials, metal oxides, solar cells, thin films, carbides, polymers, alloys, nanoparticles, and graphitic materials. Some of the papers are doubled spaced. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

In 17 presentations from Washington, D.C. in August 1994 and Chicago in August 1995, experienced practitioners provide an overview for chemists and related professionals who have not used the technique before. Within each of the three categories, they discuss such aspects as environmental, biologica

This field has now matured from being an exotic experimental field into a well-established area of science. The spectroscopy of molecules and molecular adsorbates on surfaces is one area of science where synchrotron-radiation-related studies had made an impact on understanding the ground-state properties as well as the dynamics. With the new high-brightness synchrotron-radiation sources ahead, this will certainly continue to be a field of very active research.

Volume 49 of Reviews in Mineralogy and Geochemistry reviews the state of the art of synchrotron radiation applications in low temperature geochemistry and environmental science, and offer speculations on future developments. The reader of this volume will acquire an appreciation of the theory and applications of synchrotron radiation in low temperature geochemistry and environmental science, as well as the significant advances that have been made in this area in the past two decades. It gives a fairly comprehensive overview of synchrotron radiation applications in low temperature geochemistry and environmental science, describes the ways that synchrotron radiation is generated, including a history of synchrotrons and a discussion of aspects of synchrotron radiation that are important to the experimentalist, describes specific synchrotron methods that are most useful for single-crystal surface and mineral-fluid interface studies as well as methods that can be used more generally for investigating complex polyphase fine-grained or amorphous materials, including soils, rocks, and organic matter.