Many people collaborated on the research described in this thesis. In particular I would like to thank Jagadeesh Moodera, Eric Tkaczyk, Paul Tedrow, and Mike Blaho of the Francis Bitter National Magnet Laboratory for many hours of assistance with the low-temperature experiments. Special thanks go to Mike Blaho for straightening the (ahem) bent 3He refrigerator. The high-field experiments could not have been performed without the assistance of Nai-chang Yeh and Bruce Brandt.
The neutron diffraction experiments were performed at the National Bureau of Standards reactor in collaboration with Dan Neumann, Bill Kamitakahara, and Ann Bouchard. The advice of Dan and Bill regarding the data analysis was invaluable. Nagel Stone machined the neutron sample cells, and also provided a lot of useful advice over the years.
Gerhard Roth and María Kudisch assisted with sample preparation and x-ray characterization in the early part of the KHg-GIC study. Dr. Toshiaki Enoki of the Tokyo Institute of Technology participated in the early hydrogenation experiments. Many of the ideas concerning the hydrogenation experiments come either from his advice or his publications.
Of the students in the MGM research group, I would especially like to thank Jim Speck for answering so many elementary materials science questions about metallurgy and structural analysis. Thanks also go to James Nicholls for assistance in performing resistivity measurements, and Gary Doll and Yachin Liu for taking the Raman data. Gary greatly improved our methods of GIC synthesis when he arrived, so all the work on the KHg-GIC's has benefitted from his expertise. He also built the hydrogen train which was used in the later stages of the hydrogenation experiments. Special thanks go to James, Gary, and Jim for timely loans of equipment, some of which was even borrowed with their consent.
This thesis could not have been written without Gene Dresselhaus, Lt. John Steinbeck, Eliot Dresselhaus, and Paul Dresselhaus, who kept the VAX running most of the time. Eliot supplied the text processing and graphics software with which this document and its figures were produced.
Most of all I would like to thank Wolfgang S. Rupprecht, partly for tangible favors like explaining electronics, debugging my computer programs, and making lots of tea. I would especially like to thank Wolfgang for encouragement when I most needed it.
Finally, I would like to express my gratitude to the teachers who made my experience in graduate school worthwhile. Frank Payne has always been very generous with his time, and he puts a lot more effort than necessary into teaching students about machining. Terry Orlando and Paul Tedrow provided a great deal of expert advice about the theory of superconductivity and data analysis. Professors Joannopolous, Jaffe, Tinkham and Jackiw taught courses which were not only valuable but inspirational. I also learned a great deal from the many courses taught by my thesis supervisor, Mildred Dresselhaus. I would like to express my gratitude to Millie and to Gene Dresselhaus for their knowledge, expertise and guidance.