Semiconductors

With this issue of the “Digest of the Literature on Dielectrics,” a new section on semiconductors is being included. It may seem a little unexpected for conducting materials to be covered by a publication normally dealing with insulators. Modern theories of the solid state, however, have revealed the intimate relations existing between all types of solids; so the section represents an extension of ideas rather than a breach of principle. There is an equally cogent practical reason for this coverage in view of the present interest in circuit elements involving semiconductors, e.g. crystal rectifiers and, more recently, the semiconducting triode, the transistor. These developments have enormously stimulated research on fundamental problems on the electronic energy states in solids, the process of conduction, and on phenomena at metal-semiconductor contacts; the results of which may be expected to add materially to our understanding of the properties of solids of all types.