"The book begins with an overview of each area in an attempt to make the subject matter accessible to workers in different disciplines. The basic theoretical ground-work for describing and exploring energy landscapes is then introduced, including the Born-Oppenheimer approximation, symmetry considerations and features of the potential energy surface. The emergence of structure, dynamics and thermodynamics and their relation to the landscape is then described, followed by applications to clusters, biomolecules and glasses in the final three chapters." "Beautifully illustrated in full colour throughout, this book is aimed at graduate students and workers in the field."--BOOK JACKET.