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Tom McLeish delves into the growing field of soft matter - the study of materials such as polymers, colloids, liquid crystals, and foams. Looking beneath their appearance to their inner structure, he discusses their shared physical properties, the principle of Brownian Motion that underlies all soft matter, and the applications of these materials.

The study of "soft matter" materials with complex properties has raised a number of interesting problems in basic physics, biology, and materials science, all of which promise new and important technological applications. After a review of chemical bonds and phase transitions, the authors treat topics such as surface phenomena, stability of colloidal systems, structural properties of polymers, and topological defects. The monograph's emphasis on underlying physical principles offers a coherent treatment of the great variety of research in the field.

This book reports new results in condensed matter physics for which topological methods and ideas are important. It considers, on the one hand, recently discovered systems such as carbon nanocrystals and, on the other hand, new topological methods used to describe more traditional systems such as the Fermi surfaces of normal metals, liquid crystals and quasicrystals. The authors of the book are renowned specialists in their fields and present the results of ongoing research, some of it obtained only very recently and not yet published in monograph form.

Now in paperback, this book provides an overview of the physics of condensed matter systems. Assuming a familiarity with the basics of quantum mechanics and statistical mechanics, the book establishes a general framework for describing condensed phases of matter, based on symmetries and conservation laws. It explores the role of spatial dimensionality and microscopic interactions in determining the nature of phase transitions, as well as discussing the structure and properties of materials with different symmetries. Particular attention is given to critical phenomena and renormalization group methods. The properties of liquids, liquid crystals, quasicrystals, crystalline solids, magnetically ordered systems and amorphous solids are investigated in terms of their symmetry, generalised rigidity, hydrodynamics and topological defect structure. In addition to serving as a course text, this book is an essential reference for students and researchers in physics, applied physics, chemistry, materials science and engineering, who are interested in modern condensed matter physics.

This course-based primer provides newcomers to the field with a concise introduction to some of the core topics in the emerging field of topological insulators. The aim is to provide a basic understanding of edge states, bulk topological invariants, and of the bulk--boundary correspondence with as simple mathematical tools as possible. The present approach uses noninteracting lattice models of topological insulators, building gradually on these to arrive from the simplest one-dimensional case (the Su-Schrieffer-Heeger model for polyacetylene) to two-dimensional time-reversal invariant topological insulators (the Bernevig-Hughes-Zhang model for HgTe). In each case the discussion of simple toy models is followed by the formulation of the general arguments regarding topological insulators. The only prerequisite for the reader is a working knowledge in quantum mechanics, the relevant solid state physics background is provided as part of this self-contained text, which is complemented by end-of-chapter problems.

This book contains lecture notes by world experts on one of the most rapidly growing fields of research in physics. Topological quantum phenomena are being uncovered at unprecedented rates in novel material systems. The consequences are far reaching, from the possibility of carrying currents and performing computations without dissipation of energy, to the possibility of realizing platforms for topological quantum computation.The pedagogical lectures contained in this book are an excellent introduction to this blooming field. The lecture notes are intended for graduate students or advanced undergraduate students in physics and mathematics who want to immerse in this exciting XXI century physics topic. This Les Houches Summer School presents an overview of this field, along with a sense of its origins and its placement on the map of fundamental physics advancements. The School comprised a set of basic lectures (part 1) aimed at a pedagogical introduction of the fundamental concepts, which was accompanied by more advanced lectures (part 2) covering individual topics at the forefront of today's research in condensed-matter physics.