The high-resolution multiscale materials characterization research team at Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU), department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering (MTP), is devoted to understanding the correlation between the microstructure and material properties at different length scales. The majority of our research is focused on mechanical properties and corrosion resistance of metallic alloys as a function of their microstructure.

As shown in above figure the materials paradigm represented in the form of a tetrahedron which connecting the processing, microstructure, properties and performance, i.e. the basis of materials science. This involves studying the structure of materials and relating them to their properties. Once we know about the microstructure-property correlation, we can then go on to examine the relative performance of the material in a given application. The primary determinants of the structure of the material and thus of its properties are its constituent chemical elements and the way in which it has been processed into its final form. These characteristics, taken together and related through the laws of thermodynamics and kinetics, govern a material's microstructure, and thus its properties. At the central point of this pyramid is characterization which gives insight on microstructure, properties, and their correlation. What we mean by characterization is a broad and general process by which a material's structure and properties are probed and measured. It is a fundamental process in the field of materials science, without which no scientific understanding of engineering materials could be ascertained. The scope of the term often differs; some definitions limit the term's use to techniques which study the microscopic structure and properties of materials, while others use the term to refer to any materials analysis process including macroscopic techniques such as mechanical testing, thermal analysis, and density calculation. The scale of the structures observed in materials characterization ranges from angstroms, such as in the imaging of individual atoms and chemical bonds, up to centimeters, such as in the imaging of coarse grain structures in metals.