Deep and detailed discussions on chemistry, chemical physics, photoelectrochemistry, photophysics, photocatalysis and possible applications of nanostructured semiconductor materials have shown increasing interest in the matter by scientists representing various research areas as well as industrial enterprises. Indeed, solar energy conversion and chemical methods for its realization became very popular again after the “great jump†of renewable energy sources between the middle of the 1970s and the beginning of the 1980s.
Several excellent books have been published over the past years, however, in these books no attempt was made to approach this research area from the point of view of classical chemical physics.
With this book, the editors aim: a) to generate an adequate scope of the modern trends and data obtained during the last years in the area of chemical physics of nanostructured materials, in particular, nanocrystalline semiconductors; b) to select an equal mix of scientists from Western and Eastern countries, all of them experts in their respective research areas; and c) to present to the international scientific community many interesting and important results which have been obtained by former Soviet Union researchers, but are not well known because they had originally been published in Russian books and journals.
This book will be interesting and useful for scientists working in the area of semiconductor nanotechnology, photoelectrochemistry, photocatalysis, photochemistry of water and air purification, as well as for graduate and post-graduate students who are planning to join these research areas.

Detlef W Bahnemann studied chemistry at the TU Berlin, Germany, where he received his Ph.D. in 1981. From 1981 to 1988 he worked as a Senior Scientist at the Hahn-Meitner-Institute (HMI) Berlin with Prof. Arnim Henglein. He joined the group of Prof. M. R. Hoffmann at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, USA as a Visiting Associate (1985-1987). In 1988-2002 he was a Department Head at the Institute for Solar Energy Research (ISFH) in Hannover, FRG. Since June 2002 he became an Academic Director at the Institute for Technical Chemistry of the Hannover University where he is responsible for the research field of Photochemistry and Nanotechnology. Prof. Dr. Bahnemann is Honorary Visiting Prof, at the Robert-Gordon Univ. in Aberdeen (UK), Lecturer for Physical Chemistry at the Carl-von Ossietzky University in Oldenburg, FRG. Alexander L Kokorin was born in 1947. Was graduated as a biophysicist in 1970; Ph.D. (Candidate of Sciences) in 1974; D.Sc. degree (Doctor of Sciences) in physical chemistry - in 1992. At present: Principal Researcher and Deputy Head of the Division of Kinetics and Catalysis, N. Semenov Institute of Chemical Physics of Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow, Russia. Area of research interests: chemical methods of solar energy conversion; chemical physics of organized molecular systems, including nanosized oxide semiconductors doped with transition metal ions, and polymer-metal complexes; the study of their structure, absorptive, catalytic, photocatalytic and photoelectrochemical properties. EPR spectroscopy and spin-spin interaction between paramagnetics. He is the author and co-author of more than 170 publications, including two books and several reviews and book chapters.