The branch of engineering involved in the research, design, improvement, operation, and commercialization of plants, processes, and products for the chemical industry and related fields, such as biotechnology, energy, and materials. The work of chemical engineers has evolved continuously with the changing needs of society. Chemical engineering arose from attempts at inventing ways to make products such as gunpowder and wine. Early on (in the nineteenth century), the large-scale and efficient manufacturing of inorganic chemicals, such as salt, soda ash, sulfuric acid, and nitrogen fixation, were the main occupation of American chemical engineers. However, for the small-scale dyestuff and drug industries in Europe, chemical engineers were less involved. In the twentieth century, large-scale petroleum refining, petrochemicals, and polymers were the dominant industrial problems. In the twenty-first century, the focus has shifted to smaller-scale processes across many disciplines of science and technology, such as molecular biology, genetics, information technology, and nanotechnology. See also: Genetics; Information technology; Inorganic chemistry; Nanotechnology; Petrochemical; Polymer; Process engineering
Professional work and achievements
Chemical engineers work in the development, manufacturing, and service sectors. They are engaged in the design, construction, and operation of equipment and plants. Increasingly, chemical engineers are involved in product engineering, which is the design of new products and the improvement of existing products such as controlled drug-delivery devices, biodegradable polymers, and fuel cells. In addition, chemical engineers play an important role in the commercialization of novel medicines, materials, and environmental remediation and recycling technology. See also: Drug delivery systems; Fuel cell; Recycling technology
Chemical engineers often play leading roles in the manufacturing industries of basic chemicals and petroleum refining. They work in pharmaceutical, biochemical, biomedical, food, agricultural chemicals, plastics, rubber, textile fibers, paper, ink, soap and cosmetics, and water purification industries. In the electronics industry, the manufacture of integrated circuits and other microelectronic devices involves chemical processing. Chemical engineers also are employed in services, such as education, government, business and professional services, and, increasingly, health care. See also: Biochemical engineering; Biomedical chemical engineering; Chemical process industry; Food engineering; Ink; Manufactured fiber; Microlithography; Paper; Pharmaceutical chemistry; Rubber; Textile
Some characteristic operations in chemical engineering involve the conversion of raw materials (such as petroleum) into useful products (such as gasoline, jet fuel, and asphalt), as well as the conversion and recycling of environmental pollutants (such as municipal waste). Other conversions involve chemical reactions such as the fixation of nitrogen from air into fertilizers for agriculture, physical modifications such as blowing polymers into films and extruding polymers into fibers, and biochemical reactions such as the fermentation of sugar into alcohol. These conversions also involve separations, such as making freshwater out of seawater, recovering penicillin from very dilute solutions in fermentation tanks, and extracting water and waste products from blood in artificial kidneys. See also: Chemical conversion; Chemical separation techniques; Fermentation; Nitrogen fixation; Petroleum processing and refining; Plastics processing; Water desalination
Education and professional training
Chemical engineers require knowledge in chemistry, biology, mathematics, physics, and machinery. The education and training of chemical engineers includes a rigorous curriculum of courses, laboratories, design projects, and quite often periods of industrial practice or internships. In common with other engineers, mathematics and physics form the core curriculum. The major distinction of chemical engineers is their understanding of chemistry, and increasingly of molecular and cell biology and materials science. See also: Cell (biology); Materials science and engineering; Mathematics; Molecular biology; Physics
The earliest engineering education program began in France, where mathematics played a decisive role. The modern chemical engineering curriculum evolved from a program in 1888 at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology by L. M. Norton, which was centered on the study of the applied chemistry of specific inorganic chemicals. The first paradigm, or systemic knowledge, that could be applied to many problems was the concept of unit operations, introduced in 1923 in the Principles of Chemical Engineering by W. H. Walker, W. K. Lewis, and W. H. McAdams. The concept of unit operations became the standard taught everywhere and provided the effective tools for the graduates to engineer new chemical industries. Thermodynamics and chemical reaction engineering were added later, and the accreditation of chemical engineering degrees was based on the mastery of these subjects. See also: Chemical reactor; Chemical thermodynamics; Unit operations
After World War II, during which scientists with no engineering background made the atomic bomb, engineering educators turned toward science for inspiration. Transport phenomena began as the second paradigm of chemical engineering, with the publication (1960) of Transport Phenomena by R. B. Bird, W. E. Stewart, and E. N. Lightfoot. The transport of momentum, heat, and mass is fundamental to the unit operations and chemical reactors. Applied mathematics and computation formed the basis for the rational modeling and design of chemical machinery and operations, as well as the systematic optimization of entire chemical plants. See also: Transport processes
In the United States, the American Institute of Chemical Engineers, founded in 1908, is the principal professional society. Chemical engineering became a worldwide force with the founding of the Institution of Chemical Engineers in 1953 and the World Chemical Engineering Council in 2001.
