Existing (Spitzer Space Telescope) and upcoming (Herschel Space Telescope) facilities are deepening our understanding of the role of dust in tracing the energy budget and chemical evolution of galaxies. The tools we are developing while exploring the local Universe will in turn become pivotal in the interpretation of the high redshift Universe when near--future facilities (the Atacama Large Millimeter Array [ALMA], the Sub--Millimeter Array [SMA], the Large Millimeter Telescope [LMT], the James Webb Space Telescope [JWST]), and, possibly, farther--future ones, will begin operations.