PREFACE

A. SERQUIS; C. BALSEIRO; P. BOLCATTO

Puerto Iguazú, Argentina, from 5--10 October 2008

Simposio; XIX Latin American Symposium on Solid State Physics (SLAFES XIX); 2008

SLAFES

This volume contains selected papers which have been presented at the XIX Latin American Symposium on Solid State Physics (SLAFES XIX) held at Puerto Iguazú, Argentina, from 5--10 October 2008. The conference, covering all areas of Solid State Physics, is one of the most important and traditional meetings in Physics in our region. The Latin American Symposium on Solid State Physics is a forum where researchers and students from Latin America as well as leading scientists from other parts of the world get together to exchange information, strengthen collaborations and identify new challenges in Solid State Physics. This successful series of meetings has been organised in eight different countries, the last three held in Mérida, Venezuela (2002), La Habana, Cuba (2004) and Puebla, México (2006). Following the trends of previous events, SLAFES XIX included seven plenary talks, eighteen invited talks and contributions, and 28 oral and 255 poster presentations, covering mostly the latest experimental and theoretical advances in Nanophysics, Nanomaterials and Nanotechnology, Spintronics, Magnetism, New Materials, Superconductivity, Surfaces and Interfaces, Low-Dimensional Systems, Materials Preparation and Characterization, Theory and Computing Simulations of Materials among other topics. The group of scientists participating had come from Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Cuba, Brazil, France, Spain, Switzerland and the USA We are indebted to all participants for their enthusiasm and contributions and to the members of the International Advisory Commitees. We also wish to thank to the rest of the Organizing Committee: Gustavo Lozano, Ana María Llois, Laura Steren and Edith Goldberg and very specially to Javier Schmidt, Gustavo Ruano, Marcelo Romero, Lucila Cristina and Juan Carlos Moreno for their invaluable assistance during the event. Finally we gratefully aknowledge the financial support the Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas (CONICET), Argentina, Agencia Nacional de Promoción Científica y Tecnológica (ANPCyT), Argentina, Secretaría de Estado de Ciencia, Tecnología e Innovación, Provincia de Santa Fe, Argentina, Centro Latinoamericano de Física (CLAF), Universidad Nacional del Litoral, Santa Fe, Argentina, Institute of Physics (IOP) Publishing, The European Physical Journal (EPJ), EDP Science, Societa Italiana di Fisica and Springer.