Preface: Special Topic on Dynamics of Polymer Materials in Thin Films and Related Geometries.

The last twenty years have seen a substantial effort to understand relaxation, mechanics, diffusion, and the glass transition in thin polymer films and related geometries. Recent progress in this field is highlighted in this special issue of The Journal of Chemical Physics on "Dynamics of Polymer Materials in Thin Films and Related Geometries." With the goal of providing an entry point to these 35 papers for those not working in this field, we provide some background and perspective in this introduction to the special topic section.