Interfacial growth phenomena

Growth by interface motion takes place in many different systems ranging from mesoscopic scales (solidification) to geophysical scales (earth crust formation). Despite this diversity, it displays a number of similar features that refer to a common understanding. They include the segregation of compositions by fractional crystallization, the generation of forms by instabilities, their selection by singular perturbations, the emission of sidebranches on finger-like forms and the occurrence of self-organized states. They then provide interesting implications in geophysics (gulf stream intensity, datation tools, rock segregation), metallurgy (macrosegregation), materials (microsegregation) and biophysics (algae developments, rhizoid forms). These lecture notes are intended to review them from fundamentals to recent advances