Plasma Physics Proceedings of the 1997 Latin American Workshop (VII LAWPP 1997), Held in Caracas, Venezuela, January 20-31, 1997

In 1982, the First Latin American Workshop on Plasma Physics was held in Cam- buquira (Brazil). It has been a long way since this first meeting up to the actual one, the VII LA WPP held in Caracas, Venezuela. However, the structure of this first Meeting has remained unchanged. The first week of the workshop is always de- voted at short courses in the different fields of Plasma Physics, and the presentation of contributed and review papers is carried on during the second week. In relation to the preceding meetings, the emphasis on Plasma Processing was increased and a short course in dusty plasma was introduced too. This area of plasma has become more important every year, even though the research in this field is at incipient stage in Latin-America. However we feel that its importance will increase in future years and we should keep step. A large scope of fields in Plasma Physics has been covered in this meeting, however, several areas were left aside, because the field of Plasma Physics has become so broad that it cannot be covered in such a short period of two weeks.