Abstract   Nanoparticles as Building Blocks for New Materials    Mark Brongersma Assistant Professor of Materials Science and Engineering Geballe Laboratory for Advanced Materials, McCullough Building, Rm. 349, 476 Lomita Mall, Stanford, CA 94305-4045 Phone: (650) 736-2152     Current scaling trends in the microelectronics and communication industry indicate that the size of electronic structures is rapidly approaching the electron wavelength and the smallest photonic devices have reached a size comparable to the wavelength of visible light. For future electronic devices this entails that quantum mechanical effects are going to play an increasingly important role. The design of photonic structures is running into a seemingly unsurpassable obstacle: The diffraction limit. I will describe a promising class of functional materials and structures: nanoparticle arrays. In these arrays, nanoparticles play a similar role as atoms do in a solid - building blocks of nanoparticle matter. Analogous to solids comprised of atoms, the physical properties of nanoparticle arrays are determined by the type of particle, the array structure, and the presence of defects. I will explain different routes for synthesizing nanoparticle arrays and discuss ways to analyze and control their structural properties at the atomic and nanoparticle level. A better understanding of their electrical properties will facilitate the design of more efficient light sources, non-volatile memories, and many other devices that rely on efficient charge injection and transport. Fundamental knowledge of their optical properties could make it possible to fabricate photonic functionality that beats the diffraction limit.