THE SCIENCE OF COMPLEX MATTER
The contemporary science of
materials and condensed-matter physics is changing in response to a new
awareness of the relevance of concepts associated with complexity.
Scientists who design and study new materials are confronted by an
ever-increasing degree of complexity, both in the materials themselves
and in their synthesis. Typically, modern advanced materials are
partially non-crystalline, often multicomponent, and form out of
equilibrium. Further, they have functional and structural properties
that are active over several length-scales, and might form via
self-assembly. This emerging structural and functional complexity is intrinsic and necessary to many
aspects of modern materials.
