《Fifty years of Anderson localization》.pdf

Fifty years of Anderson localization Ad Lagendijk, Bart van Tiggelen, and Diederik S. Wiersma Citation: Phys. Today 62(8), 24 (2009); doi: 10.1063/1.3206091 View online: /10.1063/1.3206091 View Table of Contents: /resource/1/PHTOAD/v62/i8 Published by the American Institute of Physics. Additional resources for Physics Today Homepage: / Information: /about_us Daily Edition: /daily_edition Downloaded 20 Dec 2012 to 7. Redistribution subject to AIP license or copyright; see /about_us/terms Fifty years of Anderson localization Ad Lagendijk, Bart van Tiggelen, and Diederik S. Wiersma What began as a prediction about electron diffusion has spawned a rich variety of theories and experiments on the nature of the metal–insulator transition and the behavior of waves—from electromagnetic to seismic—in complex materials. Ad Lagendijk is a professor at the FOM Institute for Atomic and Molecular Physics in Amsterdam. Bart van Tiggelen is a CNRS research professor at the Laboratoire de Physique et Modélisation des Milieux Condensés, Université Joseph Fourier, in Grenoble, France. Diederik Wiersma is a National Research Council research professor at the European Laboratory for Nonlinear Spectroscopy in Florence, Italy. Very few believed [localization] at the time, and even point B. One has to sum the amplitudes of all possible paths fewer saw its importance; among those who failed to and square the complex-valued end result to obtain the total fully understand it at first was certainly its author. It probability that the electron arrives at B. That probability has yet to receive adequate mathematical treatment, consists of a sum of squares—the classical, incoherent contri- and one has to resort to the indignity of n