Recently, there has been a considerable upsurge of interest in heavily doped semiconductors. This interest is due primarily to the expanding range of applications of such. materials. Moreover, the heavy doping of semiconductors produces new effects (the forma­ tion of impurity aggregates, the appearance of allowed states in the forbidden band, etc J, which are of great interest in solid-state physics. The rapid growth in the number of papers on heavily doped semiconductors makes it difficult to review the results obtained so far. Therefore, many investigations carried out in 1966-7, par­ ticularly those on AIIIBV semiconductors, are not discussed in the present monograph, which represents the state of the knowledge in 1965. Nevertheless, the author hopes that, in spite of this, the book will be useful. An attempt is made, first, to review investigations of heavily doped semiconductors from a certain viewpoint and, sec­ ondly, to suggest some ideas (Chap. 5) which may be controversial but which are intended to stimulate further studies of heavily doped semiconductors which can be regarded as a special case of dis­ ordered systems. The work of American scientists investigating heavily doped semiconductors, in particular the efforts of E. O. Kane, J. 1. Pan­ kove, R. N. Hall, R. A. Logan, W. G. Spitzer, F. A. Trumbore, and many others, is well known to Soviet investigators. It gives me pleasure to learn that Western readers will now have an - v vi PREFACE portunity to become acquainted with the work done in the USSR.