In this amazing tour d'horizon, D. Allan Bromley uses the occasion of the centenary of the American Physical Society to reflect upon the growth of physics over the past 100 years, its fragmentation into numerous subdisciplines, the impact physics has had upon modern technology, and the re-emergence of the fundamental unity of the discipline in recent years. Hundreds of historical illustrations accompany the text. Bromley conveys much of the excitement and wonder that research in physics generated in the 20th century and asks what new things are in store in the next century. He covers such topics as relativity and quantum mechanics, the Manhattan project, superconductivity, transistors and the revolution brought about by solid-state electronics, protein folding, the uses of nuclear and atomic physics in biology and medicine, plate tectonics, the expansion of the universe and the Big Bang, and gravitational radiation. Bromley, the Sterling Professor of the Sciences and Dean of Yale University, served as Assistant to the President for Science and Technology Policy 1989-1993 and was president of the American Physical Society in 1997. One of the World's leading nuclear scientists, he was founder and director of Yale's nuclear structure laboratory and has received numerous medals and awards, including the National Medal of Science.

The investigation of the physical properties of matter has progressed so much during the last hundred years that today physics is divided into a large group of special branches, which are often very distant from each other. These branches arise because of the vast extent of the science itself, and are distinguished by the particular area studied, the method of investigation and so on. An independent and important branch that has developed recently is the physics of thin films. This deals with systems which have only one common property, namely, that one of their dimensions is very small, though all other physical properties of such systems may be different, as well as methods of investigating them. Usually, we investigate the physical characteristics of three-dimensional bodies. Their characteristic prop::!rties are often related to a unit volume, i.e. it is assumed that they are volume-independent. This assumption is legitimate as long as the dimensions are 'normal', i.e. more or less within macroscopic limits; but as soon as one dimension becomes so small that there is a considerable increase in a surface-to-volume ratio, that assumption is no longer valid.