A brief historical review is made of the hadron-hadron (hh) total cross section and hadron-nucleus absorption cross section measurements, made mainly at high energy proton synchrotrons. Then I shall discuss low p_tprocesses, including diffraction processes and fragmentation of nuclei in nucleus-nucleus collisions. Nucleus-nucleus collisions at higher energy colliders are then considered, mainly in the context of the search for the gluon quark plasma. Conclusions and a short discussion on perspectives follow.
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