A little over one year ago, a group of ceramics researchers from academia, government labs, and industry (Table 1) met at a workshop near Washington D.C. to identify and articulate the emerging scientific grand challenges facing the ceramics research community. Following the workshop, the group coauthored a report that was published in the Journal of the American Ceramic Society.¹

There have been forward-looking sessions at the biannual International Congress on Ceramics, but these have had a distinct technology, rather than science, focus.² Since the previous workshop in 1997 on future directions for ceramics,³ there have been some truly transformational changes in our field. In the area of characterization, atomic force microscopy, aberration-corrected transmission electron microscopy, high-speed electron backscatter diffraction mapping, three-dimensional atom probe microscopy, and dual-beam focused ion beam scanning electron microscopy have transitioned from laboratory curiosities to nearly standard methods enabling new discoveries. In the area of synthesis and processing, thin-film growth by pulsed laser deposition and molecular beam epitaxy, current-activated pressure-assisted densification, and templated grain growth are important methods for controlling the structure and composition of ceramics. Also, new phenomena have been identified and exploited, including colossal magnetoresistance, two-dimensional electron gasses, and interface complexions, to name a few. Nanoscale phenomena, just emerging 15 years ago, now permeate the field. Finally, the ability to simulate ceramics from electronic structure calculations, kinetic Monte Carlo simulations, mesoscale simulations, and finite-element models have kept pace with Moore’s law and now permit the exploration of more practical length and time scales. In other words, the landscape for ceramics research has changed dramatically in the past 15 years, and this is an appropriate time to consider challenges for the future. Other broad trends in materials research, for example, issues of sustainability, have to be considered, too.