Metallic Fractal Aggregates and Monomers

This book contains results of research carried out on physical fractals during a quarter of a century at the physics department of Université Laval. The monomers of the fractals range from nano meter to micrometer scales. They span a region considered to be a transition from quantum to classical physics. The phenomena are sometimes treated with so called semi-classical physics techniques. However, a basic problem of the approach is due to the incompatible formulation of classical mechanics with quantum mechanics. The former being deterministic in a Hamiltonian space of coordinates and momenta, which is reduced to a space of coordinates or of momenta such that there is no clear transition from quantum to classical physical spaces. The fractals observed in the studies described here show the randomness typical of quantum phenomena in configuration space yet they appear static. Only in the nano meter scale there is some evidence of fractal motion. Further studies of fractals and monomers below the nano meter scale should reveal valuable aspects of the aforementioned transition region.