ABSTRACT
In science, just as in any other area, some inventions are more important than others. The last part of the 20th century saw large surge in the development of techniques for surface and colloid chemists. In fact, these developments indicate that there is no end to this trend regarding the vast expansion in the sensitivity and level of information; therefore, in this chapter we explain some of these exciting new developments to the reader. Regarding the level of sensitivity the human aim is to achieve information at molecular scale, i.e., nm (10
m). Typical of all human experience,
seeing is believing
, so the microscope has attracted much interest for many decades. All these inventions, of course, were basically initiated on the principles laid out by the telescope (as invented by Galileo) and the light-optical microscope (as invented by Hooke).
