Classical density functional theory methods in soft and hard matter

Herein we provide a brief summary of the background, events and results/outcome of the CECAM workshop 'Classical density functional theory methods in soft and hard matter' held in Lausanne between October 21 and October 23 2009, which brought together two largely separately working communities, both of whom employ classical density functional techniques: the soft-matter community and the theoretical materials science community with interests in phase transformations and evolving microstructures in engineering materials. After outlining the motivation for the workshop, we first provide a brief overview of the articles submitted by the invited speakers for this special issue of Journal of Physics: Condensed Matter, followed by a collection of outstanding problems identified and discussed during the workshop.