Origins of scale invariance in growth processes

This article describes some recent progress in our understanding of how scale-invariant structures emerge through far-from-equilibrium growth processes. Since exhaustive reviews on various aspects of the subject are available, the emphasis here will be on a few key concepts, which are developed as comprehensively as possible. Simplicity is favored over generality; priority is given to elementary arguments based on scaling ideas and dimensional analysis, which provide the maximum yield in terms of intuitive insights. For details and technicalities the reader is referred to the extensive bibliography. (orig.)274 refs.Available from TIB Hannover: RA 831(3031) / FIZ - Fachinformationszzentrum Karlsruhe / TIB - Technische InformationsbibliothekSIGLEDEGerman