Throughout the long history of gaseous electronics, we have witnessed
the parallel growth of basic understanding of the physical processes
occurring in ionized gases, and of the application of that understanding to a
variety of practical problems. A number of technological developments
since the end of World War II, most notably ultrahigh vacuum techniques
and microwave diagnostics, engendered a remarkable increase in the rates
of growth of both aspects of the field. In view of the increasing importance
of many of these applications to critical problems facing our society, we
have decided to develop a multivolume treatise directed toward the
intelligent application of gaseous electronics principles and devices to those
problems.
The treatise will consist ultimately of about a dozen volumes. The first
three volumes will concentrate on general principles, at a level more
appropriate to the applications engineer than is now found in the basic physics
oriented texts. Thus, Volume I describes a number of representative types
of electrical discharges; Volume II will consider the microprocesses
resulting in the growth and decay of charged particles and of excited species in
the discharge; Volume III will be directed toward the interface between the
ionized gas "plasma" and surfaces. Then will follow a number of books
devoted to the practical applications of electrical discharges in various
fields, such as gaseous electronics applications of corona discharges, plasma
chemistry, the physics of the ionosphere, and thermonuclear fusion.