This book reviews recent developments in the field of polarons, starting with the basics and covering a number of active directions of research. It integrates theory and experimental results.

This book first introduces a single polaron and describes recent achievements in analytical and numerical studies of polaron properties in different e-ph models. It then describes multi-polaron physics as well as many key physical properties of high-temperature superconductors, colossal magnetoresistance oxides, conducting polymers and molecular nanowires, which were understood with polarons and bipolarons.

In the excitement and rapid pace of developments, writing pedagogical texts has low priority for most researchers. However, in transforming my lecture l notes into this book, I found a personal benefit: the organization of what I understand in a (hopefully simple) logical sequence. Very little in this text is my original contribution. Most of the knowledge was collected from the research literature. Some was acquired by conversations with colleagues; a kind of physics oral tradition passed between disciples of a similar faith. For many years, diagramatic perturbation theory has been the major theoretical tool for treating interactions in metals, semiconductors, itiner ant magnets, and superconductors. It is in essence a weak coupling expan sion about free quasiparticles. Many experimental discoveries during the last decade, including heavy fermions, fractional quantum Hall effect, high temperature superconductivity, and quantum spin chains, are not readily accessible from the weak coupling point of view. Therefore, recent years have seen vigorous development of alternative, nonperturbative tools for handling strong electron-electron interactions. I concentrate on two basic paradigms of strongly interacting (or con strained) quantum systems: the Hubbard model and the Heisenberg model. These models are vehicles for fundamental concepts, such as effective Ha miltonians, variational ground states, spontaneous symmetry breaking, and quantum disorder. In addition, they are used as test grounds for various nonperturbative approximation schemes that have found applications in diverse areas of theoretical physics.

A distinctive introduction to the principles governing polaron science for experimental and theoretical graduate students and researchers.

Suitable for advanced undergraduates and graduate students, this text develops the techniques of path integration and deals with applications, covering a host of illustrative examples. 26 figures. 1981 edition.

Starting from first principles, this book introduces the fundamental concepts and methods of dissipative quantum mechanics and explores related phenomena in condensed matter systems. Major experimental achievements in cooperation with theoretical advances have brightened the field and brought it to the attention of the general community in natural sciences. Nowadays, working knowledge of dissipative quantum mechanics is an essential tool for many physicists. This book -- originally published in 1990 and republished in 1999 and and 2008 as enlarged second and third editions -- delves significantly deeper than ever before into the fundamental concepts, methods and applications of quantum dissipative systems.This fourth edition provides a self-contained and updated account of the quantum mechanics of open systems and offers important new material including the most recent developments. The subject matter has been expanded by about fifteen percent. Many chapters have been completely rewritten to better cater to both the needs of newcomers to the field and the requests of the advanced readership. Two chapters have been added that account for recent progress in the field. This book should be accessible to all graduate students in physics. Researchers will find this a rich and stimulating source.

Now updated—the leading single-volume introduction to solid state and soft condensed matter physics This Second Edition of the unified treatment of condensed matter physics keeps the best of the first, providing a basic foundation in the subject while addressing many recent discoveries. Comprehensive and authoritative, it consolidates the critical advances of the past fifty years, bringing together an exciting collection of new and classic topics, dozens of new figures, and new experimental data. This updated edition offers a thorough treatment of such basic topics as band theory, transport theory, and semiconductor physics, as well as more modern areas such as quasicrystals, dynamics of phase separation, granular materials, quantum dots, Berry phases, the quantum Hall effect, and Luttinger liquids. In addition to careful study of electron dynamics, electronics, and superconductivity, there is much material drawn from soft matter physics, including liquid crystals, polymers, and fluid dynamics. Provides frequent comparison of theory and experiment, both when they agree and when problems are still unsolved Incorporates many new images from experiments Provides end-of-chapter problems including computational exercises Includes more than fifty data tables and a detailed forty-page index Offers a solutions manual for instructors Featuring 370 figures and more than 1,000 recent and historically significant references, this volume serves as a valuable resource for graduate and undergraduate students in physics, physics professionals, engineers, applied mathematicians, materials scientists, and researchers in other fields who want to learn about the quantum and atomic underpinnings of materials science from a modern point of view.