Surface structure—an emerging spectroscopy

Abstract
The intrinsic interest in an empty box is limited, however difficult the task of evacuating it may be. It is the new vistas in science and technology opened by the ability routinely to produce ultra‐high vacua as a controlled environment that excite our interest. The challenges of generating and measuring such vacua will be described in the following articles of this issue of PHYSICS TODAY. We devote our discussion to recent developments in the study of surface phenomena, an area of science that has been both a beneficiary of and contributor to advances in vacuum technology.