Advanced materials: Challenges and opportunities

New materials, or new ways of using and combining existing materials, are b eing required to meet tomorrow's engineering applications. This need is com pounded by pressures to stay competitive by keeping costs reasonable while continuing to make new material technologies available to our APL customers . The main challenges created by today's environment include the understand ing and assimilation of the rapid technological advances being made by indu stry, the integration ansi application of these advances to APL customer ne eds, and preparation for the next set of requirements and applications made possible by maintaining a leading technical edge. The Technical Services D epartment is helping APL and its customers apply advanced material technolo gy by providing a comprehensive central resource for material synthesis, fa brication, integration, characterization, and inspection.