This volume represents the written account of the NATO Advanced Study
Institute "Lower-Dimensional Systems and Molecular Electronics" held at
Hotel Spetses, Spetses Island, Greece from 12 June to 23 June 1989. The
goal of the Institute was to demonstrate the breadth of chemical and
physical knowledge that has been acquired in the last 20 years in
inorganic and organic crystals, polymers, and thin films, which exhibit
phenomena of reduced dimensionality. The interest in these systems
started in the late 1960's with lower-dimensional inorganic conductors,
in the early 1970's with quasi-one-dimensional crystalline organic
conductors. which by 1979 led to the first organic superconductors, and,
in 1977, to the fITSt conducting polymers. The study of monolayer films
(Langmuir-Blodgett films) had progressed since the 1930's, but reached a
great upsurge in . the early 1980's. The pursuit of non-linear optical
phenomena became increasingly popular in the early 1980's, as the
attention turned from inorganic crystals to organic films and polymers.
And in the last few years the term "moleculw' electronics" has gained
ever-increasing acceptance, although it is used in several contexts. We
now have organic superconductors with critical temperatures in excess of
10 K, conducting polymers that are soluble and processable, and used
commercially; we have films of a few monolayers that have high in-plane
electrical conductivity, and polymers that show great promise in
photonics; we even have a few devices that function almost at the
molecular level.