Over ten years have passed since the first edition of this book was published, a period marked by continued growth in liquid crystalline polymer research and a gradual maturing of understanding of the key scientific issues. Whereas the first edition was the first textbook to cover the field, this second edition has been able to draw on a very much wider range of textbooks and research papers than was available in 1992. It is thus a rather different book. Certainly, it is about twice the length as it embraces more recent and more detailed understanding of particular topics such as theory and modelling and disclination structures, while at the same time introducing necessary new topics. Amongst these is the extension of a discussion of liquid polymeric structures across into the biological field, an important and potentially far-reaching area and marked in the new edition by an additional chapter (Chapter 7). The whole area of liquid crystalline elastomers, has now advanced to the point where there is a satisfying blend of experiment and theory and, accordingly, it is now covered in some detail in Sections 4.8.7 and 8.7. Even carbon nanotubes feature briefly, as they show liquid crystalline phases and disclination defects. The strong growth in the field of computational modelling of polymers means that, in addition to its contribution to theoretical understanding, it can provide a means of illustrating various liquid crystalline processes involving microstructure and defects. Considerable use is now made of this capability.