The central focus of this textbook is the elucidation of the interplay between the principle of stationary action and Schrödinger's equation, and its solution using the finite element method (FEM), a method of solving differential equations, in physical systems whose dimensions are on the order of nanometers. The treatment of the dynamics of electrons in such systems deserves a quantum mechanical description and typical applications at the nanoscale also require the modeling of electrodynamic fields. For instance, nanoscale semiconductor laser design requires the interplay between electrons and photons to be modeled simultaneously.

Aimed at graduate students and researchers in nanoscale systems, materials growth, optoelectronics, engineering, physics, and chemistry, as well as electrical engineers, mechanical engineers, computational scientists, and quantum computer developers, this book explores the development of variational methods and their implementation for several physical examples in the framework of the FEM and addresses issues that are very common in modeling nanoscale systems.