This course will introduce the basic principles of materials characterization and the common characterization techniques available at KAUST. It will cover the following topics: Diffraction methods: basic principles, interaction of radiation and particle beams with matter, XRD, scattering techniques; Spectroscopic methods; Imaging: optical including confocal microscopy, scanning, transmission electron, scanning tunneling and field ion microscopy; Microanalysis and Tomography: energy dispersive, wavelength dispersive, Auger Processes, Electron, Ion and Atom Probe Tomography, SIMS, photoelectron spectroscopy; thermal analysis: DTA, DSC. Lab visits and demonstrations will be scheduled to the class to discuss some case studies.