"God made solids, but surfaces were the work of the devil."

Once I heard a Professor quoted this Wolfgang Pauli’s saying in a lesson. This words impressed me so much that when I see any research about materials after that, it always come to my mind immediately. Unfortunately, benefits brought by elaborated-designed material structures sometimes are unimportant (and even counterproductive) if considering area effect and volume effect.

References

• Electrical breakdown.
• What is the flashover in the power system?.
• Electrical breakdown and flashover of short spark gaps in atmospheric air at transient voltages.
• The Volume Effect.