Chapter 1. Introduction
Chapter 2. Crystal Clear: Bonding and Crystal Structures
Chapter 3. The Rejection of Perfection: Defects, Amorphous Materials, and Polymers
Chapter 4. The Right Stuff: Choosing the Best Material for the Job
Chapter 5. In, Out, Shake It All About: Diffraction, Phonons, and Thermal Properties of Solids
Chapter 6. Unable to Resist: Metals, Semiconductors, and Superconductors
Chapter 7. Chips with Everything: Semiconductor Devices and Dielectrics
Chapter 8. Living in a Magnetic World: Magnetism and Its Applications.
Biography
Sharon Ann Holgate is a freelance science writer and broadcaster. She has presented on BBC Radio 4 and the BBC World Service, and presented video podcasts for medical research charity the Myrovlytis Trust. She earned a D.Phil in physics from the University of Sussex, where she was a Visiting Fellow in Physics and Astronomy for nine years. Her articles have appeared in Science, Science Careers, New Scientist, The Times Higher Education Supplement, Flipside, E&T, Focus, Physics World, Interactions, Materials World, Modern Astronomer, and Astronomy Now. She was also shortlisted for the radio programme category of the Association of British Science Writers' Awards in 2005, and for the Aventis Prizes for Science Books Junior Prize in 2003. Dr. Holgate has been a recipient of the Institute of Physics Young Professional Physicist of the Year and of a Merit Award in the Daily Telegraph Young Science Writer of the Year competition.
Praise for the First Edition
"The book is written in a very user-friendly and engaging style, as one might expect from a science writer/journalist. This way, the author succeeds in making the material approachable and interesting. The presentation is not as formal as most treatments. The emphasis is less on the theoretical and mathematical basis of the subject and more on the intuitive understanding of ideas and concepts, but the approach is fresh and the explanations are clear. What I like most of all is that it brings solid-state physics up-to-date, introducing modern topics and showing how the core ideas in condensed matter physics underpin so much of the technology we use today."
—Professor Andrew Boothroyd, Oxford University, UK
