Charge-density wave transport

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Abstract
The unusual electrical properties of certain inorganic compounds which behave as quasi-one-dimensional metals are reviewed, with emphasis on the evidence which they provide for conduction by the cooperative mechanism, involving the motion of incommensurate charge-density waves (CDWs), first suggested by Frohlich (1954). The theory of the Peierls instability which leads to the formation of the CDWs, and of the Frohlich conduction mechanism itself, is presented at an elementary level, followed by an introduction to the complications caused by the interaction of the CDW with the lattice, defective or otherwise. The main transport phenomena found experimentally are then described, and the phenomenological models introduced to account for them surveyed briefly. The review concludes with a mention of problems still outstanding.