This special issue highlights recent advances in the investigation of interfaces and interfacial processes in materials. The papers were submitted at the workshop ‘Interfacial Processes and Properties of Advanced Materials’, which took place in Caen (France) on 28–30 June 2004. The aim of the workshop was to bring together leading experts on interfaces and defects in materials to explore, from a theoretical and experimental perspective, the connection between interfacial structure, chemical composition, kinetics and other phenomena with materials properties. The theoretical contributions dealt with geometrical models as well as atomistic modelling using empirical potentials and ab initio techniques. The materials addressed included metals, semiconductors and ceramics whose industrial development needs strong support from fundamental approaches and in which interfacial phenomena play a critical role (martensites, multi-layered semiconductors, thin-film superconductors, etc.). Experimental results were reported on atomic and electronic structures, impurity segregation, grain growth and interface formation in various materials. The ultimate objective was to establish a robust understanding of the role of interfaces and defects on the properties of key, technologically important materials.
The workshop was organized in sessions followed by round-table meetings to stimulate as wide as possible a discussion on the topics of interest. The main areas were structural analysis (including HREM, STEM. EELS, X-ray diffraction and stress measurement), atomistic modelling (including pair potentials, embedded atom methods, tight-binding and DFT), physical and chemical behaviour (including migration, segregation, interface reaction mechanisms and piezo-response), martensitic phase transformations (including strain field analysis and topological theory) and interfaces in nanostructures (including ferroelectrics, high-T c superconductors and semiconductor quantum wells). In addition to stimulating discussion on interfaces, the workshop was intended to pave the way for future collaborative actions between participants at the European level. As a consequence, a research network was formed and is now collaborating within the Marie Curie Research and Training Network MRTN-CT-2004-005583: Interfacial Phenomena and Properties at Atomic Resolution and Properties of Novel III–V semiconductors (PARSEM).
From the submitted manuscripts, five papers were chosen for publication in this issue of Philosophical Magazine. They cover interfaces in superconducting ceramics, nitride semiconductors, perovskite oxides and Ge/Si quantum well nanostructures, and represent the diverse range of interfaces and materials discussed at the workshop.