Solids and Surfaces

Roald Hoffmann, born in Zloczow, Poland but educated in the US, is the Frank H. T. Rhodes Professor of Humane Letters at Cornell University. One of America's most distinguished chemists, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry. A member of the US National Academy of Sciences and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences as well as many foreign academies, Hoffmann has received 26 honorary doctorates together with numerous other honors such as the National Medal of Science. Hoffmann is the only person ever to receive the American Chemical Society's top awards in three sub- disciplines: organic chemistry, inorganic chemistry, and chemical education. For the past dozen years, Hoffmann has simultaneously pursued a literary career. He is the author of three books of poetry, "The Metamict State", "Gaps and Verges", and "Memory Effects". His three non-fiction books deal with the overall theme of the creative and humanistic sparks of chemistry: An art/science/literature collaboration with artist Vivian Torrence, "Chemistry Imagined"; "The Same and Not the Same"; and "Old Wine, New Flasks: Reflections on Science and Jewish Tradition," in collaboration with Shira Leibowitz Schmidt. Hoffmann is also is the presenter of a television course, "The World of Chemistry", which has aired on many PBS Stations and abroad.

• Preface Introduction Orbitals and Bands in One Dimension Bloch Functions, k, Band Structures Band Width See How they Run An Eclipsed Stack of Pt(II) Square Planar Complexes The Fermi Level More Dimensions, At Least Two Setting Up a Surface Problem Density of States Where Are The Electrons? The Detective Work of Tracing Molecule-Surface Interactions: Decomposition of the DOS Where Are the Bonds? A Solid State Sample Problem: ThCr_2Si_2 Structure The Frontier Orbital Perspective Orbital Interaction on a Surface A Case Study: CO on Ni(100) Barriers to Chemisorption Chemisorption Is a Compromise Frontiers Orbitals in Three-Dimensional Extended Structures More Than One Electronic Unit in the Unit Cell, Folding Bands Making Bonds in a Crystal The Peierls Distortion A Brief Excursion into the Third Dimension Qualitative Reasoning About Orbital Interactions on Surfaces The Fermi Level Matters Another Methodology and Some Credits What's New in the Solid References Index