Materials, Transmission, Treatment and Storage of Information -- Multiferroic and Magnetoelectric Materials for Spintronics -- Large Area Nb Nanolayers with Advanced Superconducting Properties as a Base for Superconducting Spintronics -- Amorphous Chalcogenide Materials with Smart Memory -- Magnetic Refrigeration: Application to the Electron Doped Manganites -- Towards Electrochromic Devices Active in the IR Region -- Nitride Semiconductors Investigated at a Nanoscale -- Prospective Terahertz Applications of Carbon Nanotubes -- Energy Related Materials -- Smart Materials and Concepts for Photovoltaics: Dye Sensitized Solar Cells -- Magnetotransport Properties of Copper Ternaries: New Solar Cells Materials -- Structural and Electrical Properties of Nano-Crystalline LiCoO2 Cathode Material Synthesized by a Simplified Combustion Method -- Ionic Transport Behavior in Na2SO4-Li2O-MoO3-P2O5 Glassy System -- Piezo- and Electro-Active Materials -- Electrical Conduction and Dielectric Properties in Piezoelectric Fibre Composites -- New Method for Preparation of Polycrystalline Langasite for Gas Sensors: Structural Studies -- Dielectric Anomalies and Relaxation Behavior in Hydrothermally Processed PLZT Ferroelectric Ceramics -- 180° Ferroelectric Domains in Thin Films and Superlattices -- Other Functional Materials -- Clays and Clay Minerals in Western High Atlas: Characterization, Geological Significance and Industrial Uses -- TEM Analysis Of Advanced Devices For Electronics Or Spintronics: From Structure To Properties -- Microstructural and Mechanical Properties of Copper Processed by Equal Channel Angular Extrusion.

Rapid evolution of trade, cultural and human relations provides the qualitative and quantitative enhancement of international collaborations, linking the countries with different economical and technological level. Delocalization of High-Tech industry inevitably leads to development of the material science and engineering researches in emergent countries, requiring transfer of know-how, restructuration of basic research and educational networks. This book presents the contributions of participants of the Advanced Research Workshop “Smart Materials for Energy, Communications and Security” (ARW SMECS; www.smecs.ferroix.net), organized in December 2007 in Marrakech in frame of the “NATO - Science for Peace” program. The objective of this event was the attempt to overview several hot topics of material physics related with problems of modern society: transformation and storage of energy, treatment and transmission of information, environmental security issues etc., with the focus of their implementation in Mediterranean Dialogue (MD) countries: Algeria, Egypt, Mauritania, Morocco and Tunisia. The workshop is an important stage in developing of the research network “Mediterranean Electronic Materials” – MEM (www.reseau-MEM.org), that has an objective to encourage the inter-Maghreb and Europe-Maghreb collaborative studies in the area of electroactive materials. Participants of the Advanced Research Workshop “Smart Materials for Energy, Communications and Security” , Marrakech, Morocco, December 2007 v vi PREFACE.