One of the virtues of experiments using the scanning tunneling microscope (STM) comes from the clarity of the results that could attract theoretical consideration. In this talk I will describe results from three subjects in condensed matter that challenge density functional theory and our knowledge of light-matter interaction at the nanoscale. Recent results obtained by the STM raise questions on the conceptual description of the van der Waals’ interactions and the hydrogen bond, the accuracy of calculating the magnetic anisotropy, spin-spin and spin-nuclear interactions, and details of the coupling of light with electrons and molecular states in a metallic nano-cavity. A theoretical explanation of these phenomena has general implications on our basic understanding of the nature of the chemical bond, the electron spin, and confined electromagnetic waves.

Professor Wilson Ho, is from Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of California at Irvine, and is a member of the National Academy of Sciences. He received his PhD from University of Pennsylvania in 1979, and joined Cornell University in 1980 as assistant professor. He became a full professor at Cornell in 1991. In 2001, he moved to UC Irvine and has since then been the Donald Bren Professor of the Physics and Chemistry department. Professor Ho's main research focuses on single molecule imaging, spectroscopy, dynamics, and chemistry, which includes development of new imaging and spectroscopic techniques for single atoms and molecules; Atomic Scale Synthesis and Characterization of Novel, Artificial Nanostructures; Single Molecule Chemistry; Nano-photochemistry and Light-Matter Interaction: Diffraction Unlimited sub-Resolution; and Spins in Single Atoms, Molecules, and Artificial Nanostructures. He has published more than 280 journal articles, and received numerous awards including Irving Langmuir Prize, Bonn Chemistry Prize, and Alexander von Humboldt Research Award. He was elected as the member of National Academy of Science in 2013.