Modern technologies rely on the ability to grow or fabricate materials of ever decreasing size such that devices and structures built up from them can operate faster and more efficiently. However, as these materials are reduced in size there comes a point where their properties change from what is commonly observed for bulk materials to a new behaviour that depends on the size of the structure in a particular direction. In this project we will investigate how very thin metal films grow on a crystal of another material. This other material is zinc oxide and is commonly used as a white pigment in paper or as an antiseptic in would dressings but it has some rather special properties. It can be made to be electrically conducting yet transparent so is useful for display technologies and solar panels; it can be made to emit laser light at high energy and also tends to grow in to very long thin wires which makes it useful as a gas sensor. All of these applications require an electrical contact to be made to the surface of the zinc oxide. Making such a contact is not generally easy as most metals do not wet oxide surfaces and tend to roll up into little balls (like water on an oily surface). However, zinc oxide is unusual as a combination of crystal structure (how the atoms are arranged in the crystal) and the charge on each atom leads to the formation of two surfaces on opposite sides of the crystal upon which metals do tend to wet (ie they spread out very thinly like oil on water). This unusual property means it is easy to grow very large but very thin metal layers, so thin in fact that their properties depend directly on their thickness. By controlling the thickness we can tune the properties of the film and effect electrical conduction, magnetic properties of the metal and chemical reactivity of the metal. In this project we will discover why metals spread out on these sort of surfaces and how to tune their properties so we can make useful devices and catalysts in the future which speed up devices, reduce our energy consumption or enable us to manufacture low carbon, efficient fuels and chemicals.