Spontaneous change of type is a widely observed phenomenon in physics. In this volume, leading experts survey from a mathematical point of view topics such as phase transitions in crystals, cluster dynamics, viscoelastic flows, motion of interfaces in thermodynamics, shocks in transonic flows, and nonlinear diffusion with finite speed of propagation. Owing to new mathematical techniques, there is now a renewed interest in these difficult questions. The present volume supplies new results but may also serve as an excellent introduction to recent literature. It will be of interest to...

This book is devoted to the applications of the mathematical theory of solitons to physics, statistical mechanics, and molecular biology. It contains contributions on the signature and spectrum of solitons, nonlinear excitations in prebiological systems, experimental and theoretical studies on chains of hydrogen-bonded molecules, nonlinear phenomena in solid-state physics, including charge density waves, nonlinear wave propagation, defects, gap solitons, and Josephson junctions. The content is interdisciplinary in nature and displays the new trends in nonlinear physics.

This is a collection of reasonably self-contained review articles on various features of wetting phenomena from both experimental and theoretical points of view. The experimental papers are concerned with wetting at nanoscopic scales, magnetic wetting transitions, convection at interfaces, and adsorption on a surface. The theoretical part is constituted by recent exact results at d=3, some reviews on wetting and disorder, a mathematical description of wetting, front propagation, random surfaces, and wetting within Potts models. The book addresses researchers, engineers, and graduate...

The contributions to this volume review the mathematical description of complex phenomena from both a deterministic and stochastic point of view. The interface between theoretical models and the understanding of complexity in engineering, physics and chemistry is explored. The reader will find information on neural networks, chemical dissipation, fractal diffusion, problems in accelerator and fusion physics, pattern formation and self-organisation, control problems in regions of insta- bility, and mathematical modeling in biology.

This monograph teaches advanced undergraduate students and practitioners how to use folded diagrams to calculate properties of complex particle systems such as atomic nuclei, atoms and molecules in terms of interactions among their constituents. Emphasis is on systems with valence particles in open shells. Detailed diagram rules are derived and illustrated by simple examples. Applications include nuclear optical model potentials, meson-exchange theory of the nucleon-nucleon interactions and molecular-structure problems.

The contributions in this volume focus on the use of general connectivity (unstructured) adaptive meshes for Lagrangian calculations but contain a substantial amount of material on Euler and arbitrary Lagrange-Euler techniques as well. Contributions on the smooth particle hydrodynamics method and on deterministic vortex methods broaden the scope of the material and allow comparisons of different, though allied, techniques to be made. The format of the conference was designedto optimize the interaction among the attendees. An edited version of roundtable discussions is included in these...

This volume contains a series of six lecture courses presented by some of the leading exponents in the field of low-temperature physics. Special emphasis is given to theoretical and experimental advances in our understanding of 3He, heavy fermion systems and high-Tc superconductivity. The book provide an ideal basis for graduate courses in low-temperature physics.

The articles in this book deal with energetic hadron processes near astrophysical compact objects, including compact binary systems and active galactic nuclei. A variety of observational results suggest that relativistic hadrons can be produced in the vicinity of these objects. Amongthe topics treated in detail are the question whether a large fraction of the energy produced by active galactic nuclei is channeled into a population of relativistic protons and the problem of the origin of very high and ultra-high energy gamma rays from galactic compact sources.

High-energy ion-atom collisions are subject of intense investigation in present-day atomic physics. They give fundamental information on the collision mechanism of ions and atoms, and on their highly excited states. This book includes invited survey talks, and invited contributions, all carefully refereed. The topics covered are electron capture and loss (including ionization), double electron and resonance processes, electron correlation and post-collision interaction effects, collisions of antiparticles with atoms, and so forth.

The pedagogically presented lectures deal with viscoelastic behaviour of fluids, the compatibility of rheological theories with nonequilibrium thermodynamics, fluids under shear, and polymer behaviour in solution and in biological systems. The main aims of the book are to stress the importance of the study of rheological systems for statistical physics and nonequilibrium thermodynamics and to present recent results in rheological modelling. The book will be a valuable source for both students and researchers.