Preface: Phys. Status Solidi C 3–4/2012

The 9th International Conference on Nitride Semiconductors (ICNS‐9) was held in Glasgow, Scotland from 10th to 15th July 2011. The conference continues the successful series of biennial events started in Nagoya in 1995, and followed by meetings in Tokushima (1997), Montpellier (1999), Denver (2001), Nara (2003), Bremen (2005), Las Vegas (2007), and most recently Jeju, Korea in 2009. Despite the ongoing global economic climate, the conference was very well attended with a record 1050 participants enjoying a summer week in Glasgow, experiencing some Scottish culture, including a trip on the last seagoing paddle steamer in the world or to the whisky distilleries, in addition to the scientific programme. The growing attendance is testament to the continuing development of III‐nitrides as a material for a wealth of applications, including those needed for a ‘greener’ world, with applications in both more powerful and efficient lighting and electrical power transmission. Nearly 1000 abstracts were submitted to the conference, leading to 378 oral and 509 poster presentations. The field continues to grow and diversify, and as a result, for the first time, the conference series ran four parallel sessions. The meeting was divided into 12 different symposia, covering the entire spectrum of III‐nitride semiconductor research and application, extending to cover newer, or less developed concepts such as solar cells and sensor applications. The organisers are very grateful to the 49 members of the programme committee who worked hard to rank the submissions, as well as identify topical and stimulating invited speakers. We are particularly grateful to the subject chairs (P. Dawson, T. Martin and T. Wang) and regional chairs (D. Hommel, Y. Kawakami, and W. Walukiewicz) for their invaluable help and advice, and to K. P. O'Donnell for coordinating the stimulating rump sessions. Many thanks are due to the International Advisory Committee for their advice concerning the event arrangements, conference structure and invited speakers. We would also like to the sponsors and agencies for all their financial support, particularly the UK Nitrides Consortium and British Association of Crystal Growth, for their funding in the initial stages. We received 184 submissions for the conference proceedings to be published in physica status solidi , using their standard evaluation procedures. Of these 177 have been accepted for publication in this special volume, with 37 being accepted for the special sections: Phys. Status Solidi A and B . We are grate‐ ful to the editorial support provided by Stefan Hildebrandt, Julia Hübner and their team in bringing the proceedings together, as well as to our Guest co‐Editors (P. J. Klar, M. A. Migliorato, M. A. Moram, and T. C. Sadler). Finally we thank all those who attended and contributed to making ICNS‐9 such an enjoyable conference and we look forward to meeting you all again in Washington at ICNS‐10 in 2013 (© 2012 WILEY‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)