The present set of lecture notes originates from the deeply felt need in the community to
bridge the gap between beamline manuals and advanced graduate textbooks. The volume is a
collection of tutorials surveys and reviews. They cover most cases of relevance and interest
where the combination of synchrotron light with various scattering and diffraction techniques
is a very helpful approach to obtaining essential information about the structure of large
molecular assemblies in low-ordered environments. Soft condensed matter and biomaterials as
well as complex fluids are typical of the materials considered here. Contributions to this
volume have been selected on the basis of their close relevance to advanced synchrotron
radiation sources and state-of-the art beamline work.
