Book excerpt: This proceedings volume is the permanent record of the Materials Research Society symposium entitled "GaN and Related Alloys," held November 30-December 4, 1998, at the MRS Fall Meeting in Boston, Massachusetts. The symposium covered the full spectrum of activity in the GaN and related materials arena. These semiconductors are finding applications in full-color displays, high- density information storage, white lighting for indoor or backlit displays, solar-blind UV detectors, high-power/high-temperature electronics, and for covert undersea communications. The symposium contained a plenary session with talks on laser diodes, electronic devices, substrates, etching, contacts, and piezoelectric and pyroelectric properties. This was followed by sessions on laser diodes and spectroscopy; conventional growth and characterization; epitaxial lateral overgrowth and selective growth; theory, defects, transport, and bandstructure; surfaces, theory, and processing; LEDs, UV detectors, and optical properties; electronic devices and processing; quantum dots; novel growth, doping, and processing; and finally, rare-earth doping and optical emission.