Materials Structure and Characterization

Understanding the structure of materials, especially at the atomic level, is fundamental to materials design for targeted properties and applications. This course introduces crystallographic formalisms for describing the structure of metals, ceramics, and semiconductors. Students will also learn about characterization methods commonly used to probe materials structure, focusing on X-ray diffraction (XRD) and electron microscopy (EM). Students will develop foundational vocabulary and analytical skills for studying the structure of engineering materials. Prerequisites: ENGR 50 (introductory MatSci) is a pre-/co-requisite. Familiarity with linear algebra is helpful, but not required.