This is a story about sand and how science and silicon changed our lives over the last century science taught us how to take this most common material and create the products on which we depend. This is a story about sand and how science and silicon changed our lives over the last century science taught us how to take this most common material and create the products on which we depend it allows us to determine the atomic structure of materials and to grow novel new materials atomic layer by atomic layer. Sand and silicon science that changed the world denis mcwhan 9780199640270 books amazonca. The effect of introducing dopants into silicon leads into semiconductors and transistors and of course computer chips solar cells semiconductor lasers and leds as well as optical fibres