The new Institute for Critical Technology and Applied Science (ICTAS) will attract top faculty and students, foster collaboration between researchers, increase research funding, and provide infrastructure and space to facilitate these aims. The ICTAS Initiative at Virginia Tech (led by the College of Engineering) will involve the construction of several new buildings comprising a multi-disciplinary research laboratory and a 15,000 ft2 state-of-the-art Advanced Materials Characterization Facility (AMCF). The AMCF facility will be formed by a collection of new and existing tools for processing, characterizing, and testing materials at the macro, micro, and nanometer scales. Of the expected cost of $12M in equipment for the AMCF, the University has already provided $3.2M to purchase a High-Resolution Transmission Electron Microscope (HRTEM) and an ion microprobe.