Nanotechnology for chemical engineers

CERN Document Server

Salaheldeen Elnashaie, Said; Hashemipour Rafsanjani, Hassan

2015-01-01

The book describes the basic principles of transforming nano-technology into nano-engineering with a particular focus on chemical engineering fundamentals. This book provides vital information about differences between descriptive technology and quantitative engineering for students as well as working professionals in various fields of nanotechnology. Besides chemical engineering principles, the fundamentals of nanotechnology are also covered along with detailed explanation of several specific nanoscale processes from chemical engineering point of view. This information is presented in form of practical examples and case studies that help the engineers and researchers to integrate the processes which can meet the commercial production. It is worth mentioning here that, the main challenge in nanostructure and nanodevices production is nowadays related to the economic point of view. The uniqueness of this book is a balance between important insights into the synthetic methods of nano-structures and nanomaterial...

Introduction to chemical reaction engineering

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Kim, Yeong Geol

1990-10-01

This deals with chemical reaction engineering with thirteen chapters. The contents of this book are introduction on reaction engineering, chemical kinetics, thermodynamics and chemical reaction, abnormal reactor, non-isothermal reactor, nonideal reactor, catalysis in nonuniform system, diffusion and reaction in porosity catalyst, design catalyst heterogeneous reactor in solid bed, a high molecule polymerization, bio reaction engineering, reaction engineering in material process, control multi-variable reactor process using digital computer.

Critical technologies: The role of chemistry and chemical engineering

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

1992-01-01

The purpose of this report is to identify and illustrate key contributions of chemical and chemical engineering research to the development of technologies that have been deemed critical to the economy, security, and well-being of our nation. The report surveys a wide range of vital technologies that are heavily reliant or even critically dependent on chemical or chemical engineering research. Examples were taken from the fields of materials, manufacturing, energy, transportation, public health, information and communications, and the environment. While loosely following the structure of the critical technologies report of the NCTP, our committee decided on a different approach, that of using examples backed up by extensive illustrations

Modern Cast Irons in Chemical Engineering

Science.gov (United States)

1934-11-09

fl’ceew. T I SOCIETY OF CHEMICAL INDUSTRY CHEMICAL ENGINEERING GROUP MODERN CAST IRONS IN CHEMICAL ENGINEERING By J. G. PEARCE, M.Sc., F.Inst.P...CAST IRONS IN CHEMICAL ENGINEERING By J. G. PEARCE, M.Sc., F.Inst.P., M.I.E.E.* INTRODUCTION to chemical or thermal resistance. Small blow-holes Any...consideration of modern cast irons in chemical seldom appear to reduce the mechanical strength of engineering should strictly be prefaced by a definition

Chemical Engineering in the "BIO" World.

Science.gov (United States)

Chiarappa, Gianluca; Grassi, Mario; Abrami, Michela; Abbiati, Roberto Andrea; Barba, Anna Angela; Boisen, Anja; Brucato, Valerio; Ghersi, Giulio; Caccavo, Diego; Cascone, Sara; Caserta, Sergio; Elvassore, Nicola; Giomo, Monica; Guido, Stefano; Lamberti, Gaetano; Larobina, Domenico; Manca, Davide; Marizza, Paolo; Tomaiuolo, Giovanna; Grassi, Gabriele

2017-01-01

Modern Chemical Engineering was born around the end of the 19th century in Great Britain, Germany, and the USA, the most industrialized countries at that time. Milton C. Whitaker, in 1914, affirmed that the difference between Chemistry and Chemical Engineering lies in the capability of chemical engineers to transfer laboratory findings to the industrial level. Since then, Chemical Engineering underwent huge transformations determining the detachment from the original Chemistry nest. The beginning of the sixties of the 20th century saw the development of a new branch of Chemical Engineering baptized Biomedical Engineering by Peppas and Langer and that now we can name Biological Engineering. Interestingly, although Biological Engineering focused on completely different topics from Chemical Engineering ones, it resorted to the same theoretical tools such as, for instance, mass, energy and momentum balances. Thus, the birth of Biological Engineering may be considered as a Darwinian evolution of Chemical Engineering similar to that experienced by mammals which, returning to water, used legs and arms to swim. From 1960 on, Biological Engineering underwent a considerable evolution as witnessed by the great variety of topics covered such as hemodialysis, release of synthetic drugs, artificial organs and, more recently, delivery of small interfering RNAs (siRNA). This review, based on the activities developed in the frame of our PRIN 2010-11 (20109PLMH2) project, tries to recount origins and evolution of Chemical Engineering illustrating several examples of recent and successful applications in the biological field. This, in turn, may stimulate the discussion about the Chemical Engineering students curriculum studiorum update. Copyright© Bentham Science Publishers; For any queries, please email at epub@benthamscience.org.

The large dictionary on chemical engineering

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

1995-03-01

This book mentions the large dictionary on chemical engineering. It starts the preface. It mentions introduction for publish committee. It also has signature of publish committee. It introduces explanatory notes. It gives descriptions of glossary on chemical engineering. This has appendixes and index. This book consists of seven part to explain chemical engineering glossary. It was written by chemical engineering dictionary publish committee.

Engineered Barrier System: Physical and Chemical Environment

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Dixon, P.

2004-01-01

The conceptual and predictive models documented in this Engineered Barrier System: Physical and Chemical Environment Model report describe the evolution of the physical and chemical conditions within the waste emplacement drifts of the repository. The modeling approaches and model output data will be used in the total system performance assessment (TSPA-LA) to assess the performance of the engineered barrier system and the waste form. These models evaluate the range of potential water compositions within the emplacement drifts, resulting from the interaction of introduced materials and minerals in dust with water seeping into the drifts and with aqueous solutions forming by deliquescence of dust (as influenced by atmospheric conditions), and from thermal-hydrological-chemical (THC) processes in the drift. These models also consider the uncertainty and variability in water chemistry inside the drift and the compositions of introduced materials within the drift. This report develops and documents a set of process- and abstraction-level models that constitute the engineered barrier system: physical and chemical environment model. Where possible, these models use information directly from other process model reports as input, which promotes integration among process models used for total system performance assessment. Specific tasks and activities of modeling the physical and chemical environment are included in the technical work plan ''Technical Work Plan for: In-Drift Geochemistry Modeling'' (BSC 2004 [DIRS 166519]). As described in the technical work plan, the development of this report is coordinated with the development of other engineered barrier system analysis model reports

Engineered Barrier System: Physical and Chemical Environment

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

P. Dixon

2004-04-26

The conceptual and predictive models documented in this Engineered Barrier System: Physical and Chemical Environment Model report describe the evolution of the physical and chemical conditions within the waste emplacement drifts of the repository. The modeling approaches and model output data will be used in the total system performance assessment (TSPA-LA) to assess the performance of the engineered barrier system and the waste form. These models evaluate the range of potential water compositions within the emplacement drifts, resulting from the interaction of introduced materials and minerals in dust with water seeping into the drifts and with aqueous solutions forming by deliquescence of dust (as influenced by atmospheric conditions), and from thermal-hydrological-chemical (THC) processes in the drift. These models also consider the uncertainty and variability in water chemistry inside the drift and the compositions of introduced materials within the drift. This report develops and documents a set of process- and abstraction-level models that constitute the engineered barrier system: physical and chemical environment model. Where possible, these models use information directly from other process model reports as input, which promotes integration among process models used for total system performance assessment. Specific tasks and activities of modeling the physical and chemical environment are included in the technical work plan ''Technical Work Plan for: In-Drift Geochemistry Modeling'' (BSC 2004 [DIRS 166519]). As described in the technical work plan, the development of this report is coordinated with the development of other engineered barrier system analysis model reports.

The applicability of chemical alternatives assessment for engineered nanomaterials

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Hjorth, Rune; Hansen, Steffen Foss; Jacobs, Molly

2017-01-01

The use of alternatives assessment to substitute hazardous chemicals with inherently safer options is gaining momentum worldwide as a legislative and corporate strategy to minimize consumer, occupational, and environmental risks. Engineered nanomaterials represent an interesting case......, such as the use of mechanistic toxicity screens and control banding tools, alternatives assessment can be adapted to evaluate engineered nanomaterials both as potential substitutes for chemicals of concern and to ensure safer nanomaterials are incorporated in the design of new products. This article is protected...... for alternatives assessment approaches as they can be considered both emerging “chemicals” of concern, as well as potentially safer alternatives to hazardous chemicals. However, comparing the hazards of nanomaterials to traditional chemicals or to other nanomaterials is challenging and critical elements...

Chemical Engineering Education - Current and Future Trends

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Gani, Rafiqul

topics (transport phenomena, separations, reaction engineering, etc.) must remain strong, should the applications that currently emphasize commodity chemicals also include new topics such as sustainability, and product design? In Europe, the European Federation of Chemical Engineering (EFCE) has taken...... has a product focus. With this shift of the chemical industry, what should be the curriculum of the chemical engineering degrees at the BSc- and MSc-levels, and, are the skill set of chemical engineers appropriate for this altered chemical industry? While the basic skill set, defined by the core...... a leading role to define the chemical engineering curriculum. The result has been a set of recommendations for the first (BSc), second (MSc) and third (PhD) cycle chemical engineering education aligned to the Bologna Process. They recommend that students studying towards bachelor and masters qualifications...

Selecting the Best: Evolutionary Engineering of Chemical Production in Microbes.

Science.gov (United States)

Shepelin, Denis; Hansen, Anne Sofie Lærke; Lennen, Rebecca; Luo, Hao; Herrgård, Markus J

2018-05-11

Microbial cell factories have proven to be an economical means of production for many bulk, specialty, and fine chemical products. However, we still lack both a holistic understanding of organism physiology and the ability to predictively tune enzyme activities in vivo, thus slowing down rational engineering of industrially relevant strains. An alternative concept to rational engineering is to use evolution as the driving force to select for desired changes, an approach often described as evolutionary engineering. In evolutionary engineering, in vivo selections for a desired phenotype are combined with either generation of spontaneous mutations or some form of targeted or random mutagenesis. Evolutionary engineering has been used to successfully engineer easily selectable phenotypes, such as utilization of a suboptimal nutrient source or tolerance to inhibitory substrates or products. In this review, we focus primarily on a more challenging problem-the use of evolutionary engineering for improving the production of chemicals in microbes directly. We describe recent developments in evolutionary engineering strategies, in general, and discuss, in detail, case studies where production of a chemical has been successfully achieved through evolutionary engineering by coupling production to cellular growth.

Argonne Chemical Sciences & Engineering - Awards Home

Science.gov (United States)

Argonne National Laboratory Chemical Sciences & Engineering DOE Logo CSE Home About CSE Argonne Home > Chemical Sciences & Engineering > Fundamental Interactions Catalysis & Energy Computational Postdoctoral Fellowships Contact Us CSE Intranet Awards Argonne's Chemical Sciences and

Book of abstracts Chemical Engineering: IV All-Russian Conference on chemical engineering, All-Russian Youth Conference on chemical engineering, All-Russian school on chemical engineering for young scientists and specialists. Materials of All-Russian Symposium on chemistry and extraction engineering. Chemical-metallurgical processes of ore and secondary raw material processing. Analytical control of chemical industries, man-made and natural objects

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Zakhodyaeva, Yu.A.; Belova, V.V.

2012-01-01

In the given volume of abstracts of the IV All-Russian Conference on chemical engineering, All-Russian Youth Conference on chemical engineering, All-Russian school on chemical engineering for young scientists and specialists (Moscow, March 18-23, 2012) there are the abstracts of the reports concerning polymer and composite materials technology as well as catalysis in chemical engineering. The abstracts deal with state-of-the-art and future development of theoretical and experimental investigations as well as with experience in practical realization of development works in the field of chemical engineering and relative areas [ru

Engineered Barrier System: Physical and Chemical Environment Model

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Jolley, D. M.; Jarek, R.; Mariner, P.

2004-01-01

The conceptual and predictive models documented in this Engineered Barrier System: Physical and Chemical Environment Model report describe the evolution of the physical and chemical conditions within the waste emplacement drifts of the repository. The modeling approaches and model output data will be used in the total system performance assessment (TSPA-LA) to assess the performance of the engineered barrier system and the waste form. These models evaluate the range of potential water compositions within the emplacement drifts, resulting from the interaction of introduced materials and minerals in dust with water seeping into the drifts and with aqueous solutions forming by deliquescence of dust (as influenced by atmospheric conditions), and from thermal-hydrological-chemical (THC) processes in the drift. These models also consider the uncertainty and variability in water chemistry inside the drift and the compositions of introduced materials within the drift. This report develops and documents a set of process- and abstraction-level models that constitute the engineered barrier system: physical and chemical environment model. Where possible, these models use information directly from other process model reports as input, which promotes integration among process models used for total system performance assessment. Specific tasks and activities of modeling the physical and chemical environment are included in the technical work plan ''Technical Work Plan for: In-Drift Geochemistry Modeling'' (BSC 2004 [DIRS 166519]). As described in the technical work plan, the development of this report is coordinated with the development of other engineered barrier system analysis model reports

Nuclear industry - challenges in chemical engineering

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Sen, S.; Sunder Rajan, N.S.; Balu, K.; Garg, R.K.; Murthy, L.G.K.; Ramani, M.P.S.; Rao, M.K.; Sadhukhan, H.K.; Venkat Raj, V.

1978-01-01

As chemical engineering processes and operations are closely involved in many areas of nuclear industry, the chemical engineer has a vital role to play in its growth and development. An account of the major achievements of the Indian chemical engineers in this field is given with view of impressing upon the faculty members of the Indian universities the need for taking appropriate steps to prepare chemical engineers suitable for nuclear industry. Some of the major achievements of the Indian chemical engineers in this field are : (1) separation of useful minerals from beach sand, (2) preparation of thorium nitrate of nuclear purity from monazite, (3) processing of zircon sand to obtain nuclear grade zirconium and its separation from hafnium to obtain zirconium metal sponge, (4) recovery of uranium from copper tailings, (5) economic recovery of nuclear grade uranium from low grade uranium ores found in India, (6) fuel reprocessing, (7) chemical processing of both low and high level radioactive wastes. (M.G.B.)

Engineering chemical interactions in microbial communities.

Science.gov (United States)

Kenny, Douglas J; Balskus, Emily P

2018-03-05

Microbes living within host-associated microbial communities (microbiotas) rely on chemical communication to interact with surrounding organisms. These interactions serve many purposes, from supplying the multicellular host with nutrients to antagonizing invading pathogens, and breakdown of chemical signaling has potentially negative consequences for both the host and microbiota. Efforts to engineer microbes to take part in chemical interactions represent a promising strategy for modulating chemical signaling within these complex communities. In this review, we discuss prominent examples of chemical interactions found within host-associated microbial communities, with an emphasis on the plant-root microbiota and the intestinal microbiota of animals. We then highlight how an understanding of such interactions has guided efforts to engineer microbes to participate in chemical signaling in these habitats. We discuss engineering efforts in the context of chemical interactions that enable host colonization, promote host health, and exclude pathogens. Finally, we describe prominent challenges facing this field and propose new directions for future engineering efforts.

Teaching Chemical Engineers about Teaching

Science.gov (United States)

Heath, Daniel E.; Hoy, Mary; Rathman, James F.; Rohdieck, Stephanie

2013-01-01

The Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering Department at The Ohio State University in collaboration with the University Center for the Advancement of Teaching developed the Chemical Engineering Mentored Teaching Experience. The Mentored Teaching Experience is an elective for Ph.D. students interested in pursuing faculty careers. Participants are…

Engineered Barrier System: Physical and Chemical Environment Model

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

D. M. Jolley; R. Jarek; P. Mariner

2004-02-09

The conceptual and predictive models documented in this Engineered Barrier System: Physical and Chemical Environment Model report describe the evolution of the physical and chemical conditions within the waste emplacement drifts of the repository. The modeling approaches and model output data will be used in the total system performance assessment (TSPA-LA) to assess the performance of the engineered barrier system and the waste form. These models evaluate the range of potential water compositions within the emplacement drifts, resulting from the interaction of introduced materials and minerals in dust with water seeping into the drifts and with aqueous solutions forming by deliquescence of dust (as influenced by atmospheric conditions), and from thermal-hydrological-chemical (THC) processes in the drift. These models also consider the uncertainty and variability in water chemistry inside the drift and the compositions of introduced materials within the drift. This report develops and documents a set of process- and abstraction-level models that constitute the engineered barrier system: physical and chemical environment model. Where possible, these models use information directly from other process model reports as input, which promotes integration among process models used for total system performance assessment. Specific tasks and activities of modeling the physical and chemical environment are included in the technical work plan ''Technical Work Plan for: In-Drift Geochemistry Modeling'' (BSC 2004 [DIRS 166519]). As described in the technical work plan, the development of this report is coordinated with the development of other engineered barrier system analysis model reports.

Introduction to Chemical Engineering Reactor Analysis: A Web-Based Reactor Design Game

Science.gov (United States)

Orbey, Nese; Clay, Molly; Russell, T.W. Fraser

2014-01-01

An approach to explain chemical engineering through a Web-based interactive game design was developed and used with college freshman and junior/senior high school students. The goal of this approach was to demonstrate how to model a lab-scale experiment, and use the results to design and operate a chemical reactor. The game incorporates both…

Electrochemical energy engineering: a new frontier of chemical engineering innovation.

Science.gov (United States)

Gu, Shuang; Xu, Bingjun; Yan, Yushan

2014-01-01

One of the grand challenges facing humanity today is a safe, clean, and sustainable energy system where combustion no longer dominates. This review proposes that electrochemical energy conversion could set the foundation for such an energy system. It further suggests that a simple switch from an acid to a base membrane coupled with innovative cell designs may lead to a new era of affordable electrochemical devices, including fuel cells, electrolyzers, solar hydrogen generators, and redox flow batteries, for which recent progress is discussed using the authors' work as examples. It also notes that electrochemical energy engineering will likely become a vibrant subdiscipline of chemical engineering and a fertile ground for chemical engineering innovation. To realize this vision, it is necessary to incorporate fundamental electrochemistry and electrochemical engineering principles into the chemical engineering curriculum.

Approaches to chemical synthetic biology.

Science.gov (United States)

Chiarabelli, Cristiano; Stano, Pasquale; Anella, Fabrizio; Carrara, Paolo; Luisi, Pier Luigi

2012-07-16

Synthetic biology is first represented in terms of two complementary aspects, the bio-engineering one, based on the genetic manipulation of extant microbial forms in order to obtain forms of life which do not exist in nature; and the chemical synthetic biology, an approach mostly based on chemical manipulation for the laboratory synthesis of biological structures that do not exist in nature. The paper is mostly devoted to shortly review chemical synthetic biology projects currently carried out in our laboratory. In particular, we describe: the minimal cell project, then the "Never Born Proteins" and lastly the Never Born RNAs. We describe and critically analyze the main results, emphasizing the possible relevance of chemical synthetic biology for the progress in basic science and biotechnology. Copyright © 2012 Federation of European Biochemical Societies. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Applied chemical engineering thermodynamics

CERN Document Server

Tassios, Dimitrios P

1993-01-01

Applied Chemical Engineering Thermodynamics provides the undergraduate and graduate student of chemical engineering with the basic knowledge, the methodology and the references he needs to apply it in industrial practice. Thus, in addition to the classical topics of the laws of thermodynamics,pure component and mixture thermodynamic properties as well as phase and chemical equilibria the reader will find: - history of thermodynamics - energy conservation - internmolecular forces and molecular thermodynamics - cubic equations of state - statistical mechanics. A great number of calculated problems with solutions and an appendix with numerous tables of numbers of practical importance are extremely helpful for applied calculations. The computer programs on the included disk help the student to become familiar with the typical methods used in industry for volumetric and vapor-liquid equilibria calculations.

A chemical genetic approach to engineer phototropin kinases for substrate labeling.

Science.gov (United States)

Schnabel, Jonathan; Hombach, Peter; Waksman, Thomas; Giuriani, Giovanni; Petersen, Jan; Christie, John M

2018-04-13

Protein kinases (PKs) control many aspects of plant physiology by regulating signaling networks through protein phosphorylation. Phototropins (phots) are plasma membrane-associated serine/threonine PKs that control a range of physiological processes that collectively serve to optimize photosynthetic efficiency in plants. These include phototropism, leaf positioning and flattening, chloroplast movement, and stomatal opening. Despite their identification over two decades ago, only a handful of substrates have been identified for these PKs. Progress in this area has been hampered by the lack of a convenient means to confirm the identity of potential substrate candidates. Here we demonstrate that the kinase domain of Arabidopsis phot1 and phot2 can be successfully engineered to accommodate non-natural ATP analogues by substituting the bulky gatekeeper residue threonine for glycine. This approach circumvents the need for radioactivity to track phot kinase activity and follow light-induced receptor autophosphorylation in vitro by incorporating thiophosphate from N 6 -benzyl-ATPγS. Consequently, thiophosphorylation of phot substrate candidates can be readily monitored when added or co-expressed with phots in vitro Furthermore, gatekeeper-modified phot1 retained its functionality and its ability to accommodate N 6 -benzyl-ATPγS as a phosphodonor when expressed in Arabidopsis We therefore anticipate that this chemical genetic approach will provide new opportunities for labeling and identifying substrates for phots and other related AGC kinases under in vitro and near-native in vivo conditions. © 2018 Schnabel et al.

`Human nature': Chemical engineering students' ideas about human relationships with the natural world

Science.gov (United States)

Goldman, Daphne; Ben-Zvi Assaraf, Orit; Shemesh, Julia

2014-05-01

While importance of environmental ethics, as a component of sustainable development, in preparing engineers is widely acknowledged, little research has addressed chemical engineers' environmental concerns. This study aimed to address this void by exploring chemical engineering students' values regarding human-nature relationships. The study was conducted with 247 3rd-4th year chemical engineering students in Israeli Universities. It employed the New Ecological Paradigm (NEP)-questionnaire to which students added written explanations. Quantitative analysis of NEP-scale results shows that the students demonstrated moderately ecocentric orientation. Explanations to the NEP-items reveal diverse, ambivalent ideas regarding the notions embodied in the NEP, strong scientific orientation and reliance on technology for addressing environmental challenges. Endorsing sustainability implies that today's engineers be equipped with an ecological perspective. The capacity of Higher Education to enable engineers to develop dispositions about human-nature interrelationships requires adaptation of curricula towards multidisciplinary, integrative learning addressing social-political-economic-ethical perspectives, and implementing critical-thinking within the socio-scientific issues pedagogical approach.

Engineering and Evolution of Saccharomyces cerevisiae to Produce Biofuels and Chemicals.

Science.gov (United States)

Turner, Timothy L; Kim, Heejin; Kong, In Iok; Liu, Jing-Jing; Zhang, Guo-Chang; Jin, Yong-Su

To mitigate global climate change caused partly by the use of fossil fuels, the production of fuels and chemicals from renewable biomass has been attempted. The conversion of various sugars from renewable biomass into biofuels by engineered baker's yeast (Saccharomyces cerevisiae) is one major direction which has grown dramatically in recent years. As well as shifting away from fossil fuels, the production of commodity chemicals by engineered S. cerevisiae has also increased significantly. The traditional approaches of biochemical and metabolic engineering to develop economic bioconversion processes in laboratory and industrial settings have been accelerated by rapid advancements in the areas of yeast genomics, synthetic biology, and systems biology. Together, these innovations have resulted in rapid and efficient manipulation of S. cerevisiae to expand fermentable substrates and diversify value-added products. Here, we discuss recent and major advances in rational (relying on prior experimentally-derived knowledge) and combinatorial (relying on high-throughput screening and genomics) approaches to engineer S. cerevisiae for producing ethanol, butanol, 2,3-butanediol, fatty acid ethyl esters, isoprenoids, organic acids, rare sugars, antioxidants, and sugar alcohols from glucose, xylose, cellobiose, galactose, acetate, alginate, mannitol, arabinose, and lactose.

Indian Chemical Engineering Congress 1995: 48th annual session of Indian Institute of Chemical Engineers: abstracts and invited lectures

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

1995-01-01

The 48th Annual Session of Indian Institute of Chemical Engineers was held in Kalpakkam during December 27-30, 1995. The book contains the proceeding of the conference, both abstracts and invited lectures. The topics covered included various aspects pertaining to chemical engineering and technology along with the chemical and engineering processes relevant to nuclear fuel cycle like uranium ore processing, fuel fabrication, reactor operation, fuel reprocessing and radioactive waste management. Papers relevant to INIS are indexed separately

Progress in reforming chemical engineering education.

Science.gov (United States)

Wankat, Phillip C

2013-01-01

Three successful historical reforms of chemical engineering education were the triumph of chemical engineering over industrial chemistry, the engineering science revolution, and Engineering Criteria 2000. Current attempts to change teaching methods have relied heavily on dissemination of the results of engineering-education research that show superior student learning with active learning methods. Although slow dissemination of education research results is probably a contributing cause to the slowness of reform, two other causes are likely much more significant. First, teaching is the primary interest of only approximately one-half of engineering faculty. Second, the vast majority of engineering faculty have no training in teaching, but trained professors are on average better teachers. Significant progress in reform will occur if organizations with leverage-National Science Foundation, through CAREER grants, and the Engineering Accreditation Commission of ABET-use that leverage to require faculty to be trained in pedagogy.

Engineering cell factories for producing building block chemicals for bio-polymer synthesis.

Science.gov (United States)

Tsuge, Yota; Kawaguchi, Hideo; Sasaki, Kengo; Kondo, Akihiko

2016-01-21

Synthetic polymers are widely used in daily life. Due to increasing environmental concerns related to global warming and the depletion of oil reserves, the development of microbial-based fermentation processes for the production of polymer building block chemicals from renewable resources is desirable to replace current petroleum-based methods. To this end, strains that efficiently produce the target chemicals at high yields and productivity are needed. Recent advances in metabolic engineering have enabled the biosynthesis of polymer compounds at high yield and productivities by governing the carbon flux towards the target chemicals. Using these methods, microbial strains have been engineered to produce monomer chemicals for replacing traditional petroleum-derived aliphatic polymers. These developments also raise the possibility of microbial production of aromatic chemicals for synthesizing high-performance polymers with desirable properties, such as ultraviolet absorbance, high thermal resistance, and mechanical strength. In the present review, we summarize recent progress in metabolic engineering approaches to optimize microbial strains for producing building blocks to synthesize aliphatic and high-performance aromatic polymers.

Nuclear industry - challenges in chemical engineering

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Sen, S.; Sunder Rajan, N.S.; Balu, K.; Garg, R.K.; Murthy, L.G.K.; Ramani, M.P.S.; Rao, M.K.; Sadhukhan, H.K.; Venkat Raj, V.

1978-01-01

Chemical engineering processes and operations are closely involved in every step of the nuclear fuel cycle. Starting from mining and milling of the ore through the production of fuel and other materials and their use in nuclear reactors, fuel reprocessing, fissile material recycle and treatment and disposal of fission product wastes, each step presents a challenge to the chemical engineer to evolve and innovate processes and techniques for more efficient utilization of the energy in the atom. The requirement of high recovery of the desired components at high purity levels is in itself a challenge. ''Nuclear Grade'' specifications for materials put a requirement which very few industries can satisfy. Recovery of uranium and thorium from low grade ores, of heavy water from raw water, etc. are examples. Economical and large scale separation of isotopes particularly those of heavy elements is a task for which processess are under various stages of development. Further design of chemical plants such as fuel reprocessing plants and high level waste treatment plants, which are to be operated and maintained remotely due to the high levels of radio-activity call for engineering skills which are being continually evolved. In the reactor, analysis of the fluid mechanics and optimum design of heat removal system are other examples where a chemical engineer can play a useful role. In addition to the above, the activities in the nuclear industry cover a very wide range of chemical engineering applications, such as desalination and other energy intensive processes, radioisotope and radiation applications in industry, medicine and agriculture. (auth.)

Chemical engineering side of nuclear fusion power

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Johnson, E.F.

1976-10-01

It is widely recognized that chemical engineering has important roles to play in the development of national and world wide energy resources through optimal utilization of fossil fuel reserves. It is much less appreciated that there are crucial chemical engineering problems in the development of energy production from other sources. In particular the successful development of nuclear fusion power generating systems will require the solution of many problems that are uniquely suited to chemical engineers. This article presents a brief overview of the fusion development program and an identification of the major technological problems remaining to be solved

Career Opportunities in Chemistry and Chemical Engineering.

Science.gov (United States)

Glover, Trienne

This pamphlet discusses career and employment opportunities in chemical engineering. Necessary college preparation is described and median salaries by degree are tabulated. Nontraditional careers in chemistry are also described. Future demand for chemists and chemical engineers is projected to 1985 and the availability of jobs for women and…

Argonne Chemical Sciences & Engineering - Center for Electrical Energy

Science.gov (United States)

Laboratory Chemical Sciences & Engineering DOE Logo CSE Home About CSE Research Facilities People Publications Awards News & Highlights Events Search Argonne ... Search Argonne Home > Chemical Sciences & Engineering > Fundamental Interactions Catalysis & Energy Conversion Electrochemical

Hafnium - material for chemical apparatus engineering

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Jennert, D.

1981-01-01

This work describes - on the background of available literature - the properties of hafnium in technical quality (DIN-material No. 2.6400) as material for chemical apparatus engineering. The occurence, refining, physical and chemical properties will be described as well as the material behavior. In conclusion, it has been found that there is, at present, sufficient information for the engineering of hafnium which has to be completed by additional investigations for special applications. (orig.) [de

Heat Exchanger Lab for Chemical Engineering Undergraduates

Science.gov (United States)

Rajala, Jonathan W.; Evans, Edward A.; Chase, George G.

2015-01-01

Third year chemical engineering undergraduate students at The University of Akron designed and fabricated a heat exchanger for a stirred tank as part of a Chemical Engineering Laboratory course. The heat exchanger portion of this course was three weeks of the fifteen week long semester. Students applied concepts of scale-up and dimensional…

Chemical Engineering at NASA

Science.gov (United States)

Collins, Jacob

2008-01-01

This viewgraph presentation is a review of the career paths for chemicals engineer at NASA (specifically NASA Johnson Space Center.) The author uses his personal experience and history as an example of the possible career options.

Chemical Engineering in Space

Science.gov (United States)

Lobmeyer, Dennis A.; Meneghelli, Barry; Steinrock, Todd (Technical Monitor)

2001-01-01

The aerospace industry has long been perceived as the domain of both physicists and mechanical engineers. This perception has endured even though the primary method of providing the thrust necessary to launch a rocket into space is chemical in nature. The chemical engineering and chemistry personnel behind the systems that provide access to space have labored in the shadows of the physicists and mechanical engineers. As exploration into the cosmos moves farther away from Earth, there is a very distinct need for new chemical processes to help provide the means for advanced space exploration. The state of the art in launch systems uses chemical propulsion systems, primarily liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen, to provide the energy necessary to achieve orbit. As we move away from Earth, there are additional options for propulsion. Unfortunately, few of these options can compare to the speed or ease of use provided by the chemical propulsion agents. It is with great care and significant cost that gaseous compounds such as hydrogen and oxygen are liquefied and become dense enough to use for rocket fuel. These low-temperature liquids fall within a specialty area known as cryogenics. Cryogenics, the science and art of producing cold operating conditions for use on Earth, in orbit, or on some other nonterrestrial body, has become increasingly important to our ability to travel within our solar system. The production of cryogenic fuels and the long-term storage of these fluids are necessary for travel. As our explorations move farther away from Earth, we need to address how to produce the necessary fuels to make a round-trip. The cost and the size of these expeditions are extreme at best. If we take everything necessary for our survival for the round-trip, we invalidate any chance of travel in the near future. As with the early explorers on Earth, we need to harvest much of our energy and our life support from the celestial bodies. The in situ production of these energy

Mini-projects in Chemical Engineering Laboratory

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Angeles Cancela

2013-03-01

Full Text Available Chemical engineering laboratory practices based in mini-projects were design and applied the students of forestry engineering in chemical subject. This way of practice reveals a more cooperative learning and a different style of experimentation. The stated goal was to design practices that motivate students and to enable them to develop different skills, including cross teamwork and communication. This paper describes how these practices were developed and the advantages and disadvantages of using this methodology of teaching.

Chemical engineering aspects in medicine

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Chmiel, H

1981-04-01

Many basic chemical engineering processes are based on transport processes due, for example, to differences in temperature, pressure, and concentration. Such transport processes abound in the healthy circulatory system. Thus, metabolic processes supply the human body with the necessary warmth. The heart serves as a blood pump to provide optimal blood pressure in all vessels. Highly complex membranes in the kidneys ensure the efficient detoxification of the blood. It is therefore natural that the chemical engineer be involved in the solution of a number of biomedical engineering problems that come up in the field of medicine. Some typical tasks are: the characterization of the flow properties of biological fluids; research on the interaction between blood and foreign substances of the purpose of finding materials suitable for temporary or permanent use in the body and the development of blood pumps and artifical substitutes for the lungs, the liver, and the kidneys.

Proceedings of 20. Symposium of Malaysian Chemical Engineers (SOMChE 2006)

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

2006-12-01

The objective of the symposium is to provide a platform for participants and relevant chemical engineering community to meet and encourage expertise and knowledge sharing and to allow recent chemical engineering research and innovation works to be properly documented, displayed and made known to interested parties. The subjects discussed are advanced material modeling and simulation bioprocess, catalysis, chemical engineering education (outcome-based education), computational fluid dynamics, drying technology, energy, environment, fine chemicals, food engineering, oil and gas, oleochemical, particle technology, petrochemical, pharmaceutical engineering, polymer technology, process control, process system, engineering, reaction engineering, renewable energy, separation

Engineering microbes for efficient production of chemicals

Science.gov (United States)

Gong, Wei; Dole, Sudhanshu; Grabar, Tammy; Collard, Andrew Christopher; Pero, Janice G; Yocum, R Rogers

2015-04-28

This present invention relates to production of chemicals from microorganisms that have been genetically engineered and metabolically evolved. Improvements in chemical production have been established, and particular mutations that lead to those improvements have been identified. Specific examples are given in the identification of mutations that occurred during the metabolic evolution of a bacterial strain genetically engineered to produce succinic acid. This present invention also provides a method for evaluating the industrial applicability of mutations that were selected during the metabolic evolution for increased succinic acid production. This present invention further provides microorganisms engineered to have mutations that are selected during metabolic evolution and contribute to improved production of succinic acid, other organic acids and other chemicals of commercial interest.

Strategies and applications for incorporating physical and chemical signal gradients in tissue engineering.

Science.gov (United States)

Singh, Milind; Berkland, Cory; Detamore, Michael S

2008-12-01

From embryonic development to wound repair, concentration gradients of bioactive signaling molecules guide tissue formation and regeneration. Moreover, gradients in cellular and extracellular architecture as well as in mechanical properties are readily apparent in native tissues. Perhaps tissue engineers can take a cue from nature in attempting to regenerate tissues by incorporating gradients into engineering design strategies. Indeed, gradient-based approaches are an emerging trend in tissue engineering, standing in contrast to traditional approaches of homogeneous delivery of cells and/or growth factors using isotropic scaffolds. Gradients in tissue engineering lie at the intersection of three major paradigms in the field-biomimetic, interfacial, and functional tissue engineering-by combining physical (via biomaterial design) and chemical (with growth/differentiation factors and cell adhesion molecules) signal delivery to achieve a continuous transition in both structure and function. This review consolidates several key methodologies to generate gradients, some of which have never been employed in a tissue engineering application, and discusses strategies for incorporating these methods into tissue engineering and implant design. A key finding of this review was that two-dimensional physicochemical gradient substrates, which serve as excellent high-throughput screening tools for optimizing desired biomaterial properties, can be enhanced in the future by transitioning from two dimensions to three dimensions, which would enable studies of cell-protein-biomaterial interactions in a more native tissue-like environment. In addition, biomimetic tissue regeneration via combined delivery of graded physical and chemical signals appears to be a promising strategy for the regeneration of heterogeneous tissues and tissue interfaces. In the future, in vivo applications will shed more light on the performance of gradient-based mechanical integrity and signal delivery

Environmental protection, a task of chemical engineering

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Schlachter, H

1980-12-01

The environmental burden in air and water in Germany is surveyed. The terms 'eco-unobjectionable technology' and 'disposal technology' are then considered with the aid of examples. These are fundamental chemical engineering approaches for reducing or eliminating environmental burdens due to industrial production processes. 'Eco-unobjectionable processes' are those in which undesired pollutants are not even formed, i.e. when possible emissions are eliminated at source. If this is only partly possible, or impossible, then disposal measures are adopted. This means removal of unavoidable pollutants from waste gases and waste water, and the disposal of other wastes.

5th National meeting of the SA Institution of Chemical Engineers: chemical engineering in support of industry and society. V. 1-3

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

1988-01-01

The 5th national meeting of the SA Institution of Chemical Engineering was held from 15-16 August 1988 at Pretoria. The subject scope covered on the meeting include the broad spectrum of work done by the chemical engineer. The main categories include the processing of agricultural products, biotechnology, coal and hydrocarbons, the chemical engineering practice, fluid dynamics, gas treatment, heat and mass transfer, materials of construction, minerals processing, source materials and products, training and education, vapour-liquid equilibrium, and water and effluents. One seminar specifically covers process engineering in the context of nuclear reactors and two other papers cover supported liquid membrane extraction of uranium

Mathematical modeling a chemical engineer's perspective

CERN Document Server

Rutherford, Aris

1999-01-01

Mathematical modeling is the art and craft of building a system of equations that is both sufficiently complex to do justice to physical reality and sufficiently simple to give real insight into the situation. Mathematical Modeling: A Chemical Engineer's Perspective provides an elementary introduction to the craft by one of the century's most distinguished practitioners.Though the book is written from a chemical engineering viewpoint, the principles and pitfalls are common to all mathematical modeling of physical systems. Seventeen of the author's frequently cited papers are reprinted to illus

Metabolic engineering of Corynebacterium glutamicum for fermentative production of chemicals in biorefinery.

Science.gov (United States)

Baritugo, Kei-Anne; Kim, Hee Taek; David, Yokimiko; Choi, Jong-Il; Hong, Soon Ho; Jeong, Ki Jun; Choi, Jong Hyun; Joo, Jeong Chan; Park, Si Jae

2018-05-01

Bio-based production of industrially important chemicals provides an eco-friendly alternative to current petrochemical-based processes. Because of the limited supply of fossil fuel reserves, various technologies utilizing microbial host strains for the sustainable production of platform chemicals from renewable biomass have been developed. Corynebacterium glutamicum is a non-pathogenic industrial microbial species traditionally used for L-glutamate and L-lysine production. It is a promising species for industrial production of bio-based chemicals because of its flexible metabolism that allows the utilization of a broad spectrum of carbon sources and the production of various amino acids. Classical breeding, systems, synthetic biology, and metabolic engineering approaches have been used to improve its applications, ranging from traditional amino-acid production to modern biorefinery systems for production of value-added platform chemicals. This review describes recent advances in the development of genetic engineering tools and techniques for the establishment and optimization of metabolic pathways for bio-based production of major C2-C6 platform chemicals using recombinant C. glutamicum.

Efficiency of Energy Transduction in a Molecular Chemical Engine

OpenAIRE

Sasaki, Kazuo; Kanada, Ryo; Amari, Satoshi

2006-01-01

A simple model of the two-state ratchet type is proposed for molecular chemical engines that convert chemical free energy into mechanical work and vice versa. The engine works by catalyzing a chemical reaction and turning a rotor. Analytical expressions are obtained for the dependences of rotation and reaction rates on the concentrations of reactant and product molecules, from which the performance of the engine is analyzed. In particular, the efficiency of energy transduction is discussed in...

Microbial chemical factories: recent advances in pathway engineering for synthesis of value added chemicals.

Science.gov (United States)

Dhamankar, Himanshu; Prather, Kristala L J

2011-08-01

The dwindling nature of petroleum and other fossil reserves has provided impetus towards microbial synthesis of fuels and value added chemicals from biomass-derived sugars as a renewable resource. Microbes have naturally evolved enzymes and pathways that can convert biomass into hundreds of unique chemical structures, a property that can be effectively exploited for their engineering into Microbial Chemical Factories (MCFs). De novo pathway engineering facilitates expansion of the repertoire of microbially synthesized compounds beyond natural products. In this review, we visit some recent successes in such novel pathway engineering and optimization, with particular emphasis on the selection and engineering of pathway enzymes and balancing of their accessory cofactors. Copyright © 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Using Simulation to Increase Yields in Chemical Engineering

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

William C. Conley

2003-06-01

Full Text Available Trying to increase the yields or profit or efficiency (less pollution of chemical processes is a central goal of the chemical engineer in theory and practice. Certainly sound training in chemistry, business and pollution control help the engineer to set up optimal chemical processes. However, the ever changing demands of customers and business conditions, plus the multivariate complexity of the chemical business can make optimization challenging. Mathematical tools such as statistics and linear programming have certainly been useful to chemical engineers in their pursuit of optimal efficiency. However, some processes can be modeled linearly and some can not. Therefore, presented here will be an industrial chemical process with potentially five variables affecting the yield. Data from over one hundred runs of the process has been collected, but it is not known initially whether the yield relationship is linear or nonlinear. Therefore, the CTSP multivariate correlation coefficient will be calculated for the data to see if a relationship exists among the variables. Then once it is proven that there is a statistically significant relationship, an appropriate linear or nonlinear equation can be fitted to the data, and it can be optimized for use in the chemical plant.

Experiences on dynamic simulation software in chemical engineering education

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Komulainen, Tiina M.; Enemark-rasmussen, Rasmus; Sin, Gürkan

2012-01-01

Commercial process simulators are increasing interest in the chemical engineer education. In this paper, the use of commercial dynamic simulation software, D-SPICE® and K-Spice®, for three different chemical engineering courses is described and discussed. The courses cover the following topics...

At Age 100, Chemical Engineering Education Faces Changing World.

Science.gov (United States)

Krieger, James

1988-01-01

Stresses the need for chemical engineering education to keep abreast of current needs. Explores the need for global economics, marketing strategy, product differentiation, and patent law in the curriculum. Questions the abilities of current chemical engineering graduate students in those areas. (MVL)

ENGINEERED BARRIER SYSTEM: PHYSICAL AND CHEMICAL ENVIRONMENT

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Jarek, R.

2004-01-01

The purpose of this report is to describe the evolution of the physical and chemical environmental conditions within the waste emplacement drifts of the repository, including the drip shield and waste package surfaces. The abstraction model is used in the total system performance assessment for the license application (TSPA LA) to assess the performance of the engineered barrier system and the waste form. This report develops and documents a set of these abstraction-level models that describe the engineered barrier system physical and chemical environment. Where possible, these models use information directly from other reports as input, which promotes integration among process models used for TSPA-LA. Specific tasks and activities of modeling the physical and chemical environment are included in ''Technical Work Plan for: Near-Field Environment and Transport In-Drift Geochemistry Model Report Integration'' (BSC 2004 [DIRS 171156], Section 1.2.2). As described in the technical work plan, the development of this report is coordinated with the development of other engineered barrier system reports

ENGINEERED BARRIER SYSTEM: PHYSICAL AND CHEMICAL ENVIRONMENT

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

G.H. Nieder-Westermann

2005-01-01

The purpose of this report is to describe the evolution of the physical and chemical environmental conditions within the waste emplacement drifts of the repository, including the drip shield and waste package surfaces. The abstraction model is used in the total system performance assessment for the license application (TSPA LA) to assess the performance of the engineered barrier system and the waste form. This report develops and documents a set of these abstraction-level models that describe the engineered barrier system physical and chemical environment. Where possible, these models use information directly from other reports as input, which promotes integration among process models used for TSPA-LA. Specific tasks and activities of modeling the physical and chemical environment are included in ''Technical Work Plan for: Near-Field Environment and Transport In-Drift Geochemistry Model Report Integration'' (BSC 2004 [DIRS 171156], Section 1.2.2). As described in the technical work plan, the development of this report is coordinated with the development of other engineered barrier system reports

Quantum chemical approach to estimating the thermodynamics of metabolic reactions.

Science.gov (United States)

Jinich, Adrian; Rappoport, Dmitrij; Dunn, Ian; Sanchez-Lengeling, Benjamin; Olivares-Amaya, Roberto; Noor, Elad; Even, Arren Bar; Aspuru-Guzik, Alán

2014-11-12

Thermodynamics plays an increasingly important role in modeling and engineering metabolism. We present the first nonempirical computational method for estimating standard Gibbs reaction energies of metabolic reactions based on quantum chemistry, which can help fill in the gaps in the existing thermodynamic data. When applied to a test set of reactions from core metabolism, the quantum chemical approach is comparable in accuracy to group contribution methods for isomerization and group transfer reactions and for reactions not including multiply charged anions. The errors in standard Gibbs reaction energy estimates are correlated with the charges of the participating molecules. The quantum chemical approach is amenable to systematic improvements and holds potential for providing thermodynamic data for all of metabolism.

6th world congress of chemical engineering. Proceedings

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

2002-01-01

The 6th World Congress of Chemical Engineering, held in Melbourne, was structured around 6 Vision Lectures which lead to 800 oral presentations and 600 poster presentations, spanning the entire range of chemical engineering. The main topics of the Congress were: environment, health and safety; energy; industrial applications; process simulation and control; management and education and the future. Items in INIS scope have been separately indexed

Antibiotic Algae by Chemical Surface Engineering.

Science.gov (United States)

Kerschgens, Isabel P; Gademann, Karl

2018-03-02

Chemical cell-surface engineering is a tool for modifying and altering cellular functions. Herein, we report the introduction of an antibiotic phenotype to the green alga Chlamydomonas reinhardtii by chemically modifying its cell surface. Flow cytometry and confocal microscopy studies demonstrated that a hybrid of the antibiotic vancomycin and a 4-hydroxyproline oligomer binds reversibly to the cell wall without affecting the viability or motility of the cells. The modified cells were used to inhibit bacterial growth of Gram-positive Bacillus subtilis cultures. Delivery of the antibiotic from the microalgae to the bacterial cells was verified by microscopy. Our studies provide compelling evidence that 1) chemical surface engineering constitutes a useful tool for the introduction of new, previously unknown functionality, and 2) living microalgae can serve as new platforms for drug delivery. © 2018 Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.

Chemical respiratory allergy: Reverse engineering an adverse outcome pathway

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Kimber, Ian; Dearman, Rebecca J.; Basketter, David A.; Boverhof, Darrell R.

2014-01-01

Allergic sensitisation of the respiratory tract by chemicals is associated with rhinitis and asthma and remains an important occupational health issue. Although less than 80 chemicals have been confirmed as respiratory allergens the adverse health effects can be serious, and in rare instances can be fatal, and there are, in addition, related socioeconomic issues. The challenges that chemical respiratory allergy pose for toxicologists are substantial. No validated methods are available for hazard identification and characterisation, and this is due in large part to the fact that there remains considerable uncertainty and debate about the mechanisms through which sensitisation of the respiratory tract is acquired. Despite that uncertainty, there is a need to establish some common understanding of the key events and processes that are involved in respiratory sensitisation to chemicals and that might in turn provide the foundations for novel approaches to safety assessment. In recent years the concept of adverse outcome pathways (AOP) has gained some considerable interest among the toxicology community as a basis for outlining the key steps leading to an adverse health outcome, while also providing a framework for focusing future research, and for developing alternative paradigms for hazard characterisation. Here we explore application of the same general principles to an examination of the induction by chemicals of respiratory sensitisation. In this instance, however, we have chosen to adopt a reverse engineering approach and to model a possible AOP for chemical respiratory allergy working backwards from the elicitation of adverse health effects to the cellular and molecular mechanisms that are implicated in the acquisition of sensitisation

Chemical engineer in business; Kemikaru enjinia to bijinesu

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Tsuchiya, Yasuaki

1999-05-05

It is Coca-Cola and General Electric Co. (GE) that the aggregate market value is drastically expanding in U.S.A. throughout over past of 15. Direct common point is not very much found to these 2 companies. During over of 15 years, the leadership was demonstrated as management top of both companies, 2 managers who drastically contributed to the enterprise value improvement are the chemical engineer graduate both. It does be not done either mere in which that both persons with the grounded ability of chemical engineering contributed to the enterprise value improvement of the dramatic was not accidental. It is the essence of the chemical engineering,'By discerning essence of the process, the appropriate countermeasure is passed' there was it for the basis of the management of both persons. (NEDO)

Brewing as a Comprehensive Learning Platform in Chemical Engineering

Science.gov (United States)

Nielsen, Rudi P.; Sørensen, Jens L.; Simonsen, Morten E.; Madsen, Henrik T.; Muff, Jens; Strandgaard, Morten; Søgaard, Erik G.

2016-01-01

Chemical engineering is mostly taught using traditional classroom teaching and laboratory experiments when possible. Being a wide discipline encompassing topics such as analytical chemistry, process design, and microbiology, it may be argued that brewing of beer has many relations to chemical engineering topic-wise. This work illustrates how…

Engineering yeast metabolism for production of fuels and chemicals

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Nielsen, Jens

2016-01-01

faster development of metabolically engineered strains that can be used for production of fuels and chemicals. The yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae is widely used for production of fuels, chemicals, pharmaceuticals and materials. Through metabolic engineering of this yeast a number of novel industrial...... as for metabolic design. In this lecture it will be demonstrated how the Design-Build-Test cycle of metabolic engineering has allowed for development of yeast cell factories for production of a range of different fuels and chemicals. Some examples of different technologies will be presented together with examples......Metabolic engineering relies on the Design-Build-Test cycle. This cycle includes technologies like mathematical modeling of metabolism, genome editing and advanced tools for phenotypic characterization. In recent years there have been advances in several of these technologies, which has enabled...

ENGINEERED BARRIER SYSTEM: PHYSICAL AND CHEMICAL ENVIRONMENT

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

R. Jarek

2004-11-23

The purpose of this report is to describe the evolution of the physical and chemical environmental conditions within the waste emplacement drifts of the repository, including the drip shield and waste package surfaces. The abstraction model is used in the total system performance assessment for the license application (TSPA LA) to assess the performance of the engineered barrier system and the waste form. This report develops and documents a set of these abstraction-level models that describe the engineered barrier system physical and chemical environment. Where possible, these models use information directly from other reports as input, which promotes integration among process models used for TSPA-LA. Specific tasks and activities of modeling the physical and chemical environment are included in ''Technical Work Plan for: Near-Field Environment and Transport In-Drift Geochemistry Model Report Integration'' (BSC 2004 [DIRS 171156], Section 1.2.2). As described in the technical work plan, the development of this report is coordinated with the development of other engineered barrier system reports.

ENGINEERED BARRIER SYSTEM: PHYSICAL AND CHEMICAL ENVIRONMENT

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

G.H. Nieder-Westermann

2005-04-07

The purpose of this report is to describe the evolution of the physical and chemical environmental conditions within the waste emplacement drifts of the repository, including the drip shield and waste package surfaces. The abstraction model is used in the total system performance assessment for the license application (TSPA LA) to assess the performance of the engineered barrier system and the waste form. This report develops and documents a set of these abstraction-level models that describe the engineered barrier system physical and chemical environment. Where possible, these models use information directly from other reports as input, which promotes integration among process models used for TSPA-LA. Specific tasks and activities of modeling the physical and chemical environment are included in ''Technical Work Plan for: Near-Field Environment and Transport In-Drift Geochemistry Model Report Integration'' (BSC 2004 [DIRS 171156], Section 1.2.2). As described in the technical work plan, the development of this report is coordinated with the development of other engineered barrier system reports.

Introduction to computational mass transfer with applications to chemical engineering

CERN Document Server

Yu, Kuo-Tsong

2014-01-01

This book presents a new computational methodology called Computational Mass Transfer (CMT). It offers an approach to rigorously simulating the mass, heat and momentum transfer under turbulent flow conditions with the help of two newly published models, namely the C’2—εC’ model and the Reynolds  mass flux model, especially with regard to predictions of concentration, temperature and velocity distributions in chemical and related processes. The book will also allow readers to understand the interfacial phenomena accompanying the mass transfer process and methods for modeling the interfacial effect, such as the influences of Marangoni convection and Rayleigh convection. The CMT methodology is demonstrated by means of its applications to typical separation and chemical reaction processes and equipment, including distillation, absorption, adsorption and chemical reactors. Professor Kuo-Tsong Yu is a Member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. Dr. Xigang Yuan is a Professor at the School of Chemical Engine...

Pilot-Scale Laboratory Instruction for Chemical Engineering: The Specific Case of the Pilot-Unit Leading Group

Science.gov (United States)

Billet, Anne-Marie; Camy, Severine; Coufort-Saudejaud, Carole

2010-01-01

This paper presents an original approach for Chemical Engineering laboratory teaching that is currently applied at INP-ENSIACET (France). This approach, referred to as "pilot-unit leading group" is based on a partial management of the laboratories by the students themselves who become temporarily in charge of one specific laboratory. In…

Future of Chemical Engineering: Integrating Biology into the Undergraduate ChE Curriculum

Science.gov (United States)

Mosto, Patricia; Savelski, Mariano; Farrell, Stephanie H.; Hecht, Gregory B.

2007-01-01

Integrating biology in the chemical engineering curriculum seems to be the future for chemical engineering programs nation and worldwide. Rowan University's efforts to address this need include a unique chemical engineering curriculum with an intensive biology component integrated throughout from freshman to senior years. Freshman and Sophomore…

Mystery Well: Chemical-Engineering Solution to the Internal Rain Problem.

Czech Academy of Sciences Publication Activity Database

Růžička, Marek

2017-01-01

Roč. 174, DEC 31 (2017), s. 396-402 ISSN 0009-2509 Institutional support: RVO:67985858 Keywords : precipitation * humidity-driven convection * buoyant instability Subject RIV: CI - Industrial Chemistry, Chemical Engineering OBOR OECD: Chemical process engineering Impact factor: 2.895, year: 2016

Advances in chemical engineering in nuclear and process industries

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

NONE

1994-06-01

Symposium on Advances in Chemical Engineering in Nuclear and Process Industries dealt with a wide spectrum of areas encompassing various industries such as nuclear, fertilizer, petrochemical, refinery and cement. The topics covered in the symposium dealt with the advancements in the existing fields of science and technologies as well as in some of the emerging technologies such as membrane technology, bio-chemical and photo-chemical engineering etc. with a special emphasis on nuclear related aspects. Papers relevant to INIS are indexed separately.

Advances in chemical engineering in nuclear and process industries

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

1994-06-01

Symposium on Advances in Chemical Engineering in Nuclear and Process Industries dealt with a wide spectrum of areas encompassing various industries such as nuclear, fertilizer, petrochemical, refinery and cement. The topics covered in the symposium dealt with the advancements in the existing fields of science and technologies as well as in some of the emerging technologies such as membrane technology, bio-chemical and photo-chemical engineering etc. with a special emphasis on nuclear related aspects. Papers relevant to INIS are indexed separately

Defect-engineered graphene chemical sensors with ultrahigh sensitivity.

Science.gov (United States)

Lee, Geonyeop; Yang, Gwangseok; Cho, Ara; Han, Jeong Woo; Kim, Jihyun

2016-05-25

We report defect-engineered graphene chemical sensors with ultrahigh sensitivity (e.g., 33% improvement in NO2 sensing and 614% improvement in NH3 sensing). A conventional reactive ion etching system was used to introduce the defects in a controlled manner. The sensitivity of graphene-based chemical sensors increased with increasing defect density until the vacancy-dominant region was reached. In addition, the mechanism of gas sensing was systematically investigated via experiments and density functional theory calculations, which indicated that the vacancy defect is a major contributing factor to the enhanced sensitivity. This study revealed that defect engineering in graphene has significant potential for fabricating ultra-sensitive graphene chemical sensors.

The History of Chemical Engineering and Pedagogy: The Paradox of Tradition and Innovation

Science.gov (United States)

Wankat, Phillip C.

2009-01-01

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology started the first US chemical engineering program six score years ago. Since that time, the chemical engineering curriculum has evolved. The latest versions of the curriculum are attempts to broaden chemical engineering to add product engineering, biology and nanotechnology to the traditional process…

Challenges and opportunities in synthetic biology for chemical engineers.

Science.gov (United States)

Luo, Yunzi; Lee, Jung-Kul; Zhao, Huimin

2013-11-15

Synthetic biology provides numerous great opportunities for chemical engineers in the development of new processes for large-scale production of biofuels, value-added chemicals, and protein therapeutics. However, challenges across all scales abound. In particular, the modularization and standardization of the components in a biological system, so-called biological parts, remain the biggest obstacle in synthetic biology. In this perspective, we will discuss the main challenges and opportunities in the rapidly growing synthetic biology field and the important roles that chemical engineers can play in its advancement.

A systems engineering approach to manage the complexity in sustainable chemical product-process design

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Gani, Rafiqul

This paper provides a perspective on model-data based solution approaches for chemical product-process design, which consists of finding the identity of the candidate chemical product, designing the process that can sustainably manufacture it and verifying the performance of the product during...... application. The chemical product tree is potentially very large and a wide range of options exist for selecting the product to make, the raw material to use as well as the processing route to employ. It is shown that systematic computer-aided methods and tools integrated within a model-data based design...

Thermodynamics in finite time: A chemically driven engine

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Ondrechen, M.J.; Berry, R.S.; Andresen, B.

1980-01-01

The methods of finite time thermodynamics are applied to processes whose relaxation parameters are chemical rate coefficients within the working fluid. The direct optimization formalism used previously for heat engines with friction and finite heat transfer rates: termed the tricycle method: is extended to heat engines driven by exothermic reactions. The model is a flow reactor coupled by a heat exchanger to an engine. Conditions are established for the achievement of maximum power from such a system. Emphasis is on how the chemical kinetics control the finite-time thermodynamic extrema; first order, first order reversible, and second order reaction kinetics are analyzed. For the types of reactions considered here, there is always a finite positive flow rate in the reactor that yields maximum engine power. Maximum fuel efficiency is always attained in these systems at the uninteresting limit of zero flow rate

Introducing DAE Systems in Undergraduate and Graduate Chemical Engineering Curriculum

Science.gov (United States)

Mandela, Ravi Kumar; Sridhar, L. N.; Rengaswamy, Raghunathan

2010-01-01

Models play an important role in understanding chemical engineering systems. While differential equation models are taught in standard modeling and control courses, Differential Algebraic Equation (DAE) system models are not usually introduced. These models appear naturally in several chemical engineering problems. In this paper, the introduction…

Challenges and opportunities in synthetic biology for chemical engineers

Science.gov (United States)

Luo, Yunzi; Lee, Jung-Kul; Zhao, Huimin

2012-01-01

Synthetic biology provides numerous great opportunities for chemical engineers in the development of new processes for large-scale production of biofuels, value-added chemicals, and protein therapeutics. However, challenges across all scales abound. In particular, the modularization and standardization of the components in a biological system, so-called biological parts, remain the biggest obstacle in synthetic biology. In this perspective, we will discuss the main challenges and opportunities in the rapidly growing synthetic biology field and the important roles that chemical engineers can play in its advancement. PMID:24222925

Nonlinear Approaches in Engineering Applications

CERN Document Server

Jazar, Reza

2012-01-01

Nonlinear Approaches in Engineering Applications focuses on nonlinear phenomena that are common in the engineering field. The nonlinear approaches described in this book provide a sound theoretical base and practical tools to design and analyze engineering systems with high efficiency and accuracy and with less energy and downtime. Presented here are nonlinear approaches in areas such as dynamic systems, optimal control and approaches in nonlinear dynamics and acoustics. Coverage encompasses a wide range of applications and fields including mathematical modeling and nonlinear behavior as applied to microresonators, nanotechnologies, nonlinear behavior in soil erosion,nonlinear population dynamics, and optimization in reducing vibration and noise as well as vibration in triple-walled carbon nanotubes. This book also: Provides a complete introduction to nonlinear behavior of systems and the advantages of nonlinearity as a tool for solving engineering problems Includes applications and examples drawn from the el...

Cyanobacterial metabolic engineering for biofuel and chemical production.

Science.gov (United States)

Oliver, Neal J; Rabinovitch-Deere, Christine A; Carroll, Austin L; Nozzi, Nicole E; Case, Anna E; Atsumi, Shota

2016-12-01

Rising levels of atmospheric CO 2 are contributing to the global greenhouse effect. Large scale use of atmospheric CO 2 may be a sustainable and renewable means of chemical and liquid fuel production to mitigate global climate change. Photosynthetic organisms are an ideal platform for efficient, natural CO 2 conversion to a broad range of chemicals. Cyanobacteria are especially attractive for these purposes, due to their genetic malleability and relatively fast growth rate. Recent years have yielded a range of work in the metabolic engineering of cyanobacteria and have led to greater knowledge of the host metabolism. Understanding of endogenous and heterologous carbon regulation mechanisms leads to the expansion of productive capacity and chemical variety. This review discusses the recent progress in metabolic engineering of cyanobacteria for biofuel and bulk chemical production since 2014. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Conceptual Framework to Help Promote Retention and Transfer in the Introductory Chemical Engineering Course

Science.gov (United States)

Hanyak, Michael E., Jr.

2015-01-01

In an introductory chemical engineering course, the conceptual framework of a holistic problem-solving methodology in conjunction with a problem-based learning approach has been shown to create a learning environment that nurtures deep learning rather than surface learning. Based on exam scores, student grades are either the same or better than…

State-of-the-art protein engineering approaches using biological macromolecules: A review from immobilization to implementation view point.

Science.gov (United States)

Bilal, Muhammad; Iqbal, Hafiz M N; Guo, Shuqi; Hu, Hongbo; Wang, Wei; Zhang, Xuehong

2018-03-01

Over the past years, technological and scientific advances have proven biocatalysis as a sustainable alternative than traditional chemical catalysis including organo- or metallocatalysis. In this context, immobilization based approaches represent simple but effective routes for engineering enzyme catalysts with higher activities than wild-type derivatives. Many enzymes including oxidoreductases have been engineered by rational and directed evolution, to realize the catalytic activity, enantioselectivity, and stability attributes which are essential for their biotechnological exploitation. Induce yet stable activity in enzyme catalysis offer new insights and motivation to engineer efficient catalysts for practical and commercial purposes. It has now become possible to envisage substrate accessibility to the catalytic site of the enzyme by current computational capabilities that reduce the experimental work related to the enzyme selection, screening, and engineering. Herein, state-of-the-art protein engineering approaches for improving enzymatic activities including chemical modification, directed evolution, and rational design or their combination methods are discussed. The emphasis is also given to the applications of the resulting tailored catalysts ranging from fine chemicals to novel pharmaceutical compounds that use biocatalysts as a vital step. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

A Chemical Activity Approach to Exposure and Risk Assessment of Chemicals

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Gobas, Frank A. P. C.; Mayer, Philipp; Parkerton, Thomas F.

2018-01-01

activity approach, its strengths and limitations, and provides examples of how this concept may be applied to the management of single chemicals and chemical mixtures. The examples demonstrate that the chemical activity approach provides a useful framework for 1) compiling and evaluating exposure......To support the goals articulated in the vision for exposure and risk assessment in the twenty-first century, we highlight the application of a thermodynamic chemical activity approach for the exposure and risk assessment of chemicals in the environment. The present article describes the chemical...... assessment. The article further illustrates that the chemical activity approach can support an adaptive management strategy for environmental stewardship of chemicals where “safe” chemical activities are established based on toxicological studies and presented as guidelines for environmental quality...

Assessing the Higher National Diploma Chemical Engineering Programme in Ghana: Students' Perspective

Science.gov (United States)

Boateng, Cyril D.; Bensah, Edem Cudjoe; Ahiekpor, Julius C.

2012-01-01

Chemical engineers have played key roles in the growth of the chemical and allied industries in Ghana but indigenous industries that have traditionally been the domain of the informal sector need to be migrated to the formal sector through the entrepreneurship and innovation of chemical engineers. The Higher National Diploma Chemical Engineering…

A systematic approach to engineering ethics education.

Science.gov (United States)

Li, Jessica; Fu, Shengli

2012-06-01

Engineering ethics education is a complex field characterized by dynamic topics and diverse students, which results in significant challenges for engineering ethics educators. The purpose of this paper is to introduce a systematic approach to determine what to teach and how to teach in an ethics curriculum. This is a topic that has not been adequately addressed in the engineering ethics literature. This systematic approach provides a method to: (1) develop a context-specific engineering ethics curriculum using the Delphi technique, a process-driven research method; and (2) identify appropriate delivery strategies and instructional strategies using an instructional design model. This approach considers the context-specific needs of different engineering disciplines in ethics education and leverages the collaboration of engineering professors, practicing engineers, engineering graduate students, ethics scholars, and instructional design experts. The proposed approach is most suitable for a department, a discipline/field or a professional society. The approach helps to enhance learning outcomes and to facilitate ethics education curriculum development as part of the regular engineering curriculum.

Quantum Chemical Approach to Estimating the Thermodynamics of Metabolic Reactions

OpenAIRE

Adrian Jinich; Dmitrij Rappoport; Ian Dunn; Benjamin Sanchez-Lengeling; Roberto Olivares-Amaya; Elad Noor; Arren Bar Even; Alán Aspuru-Guzik

2014-01-01

Thermodynamics plays an increasingly important role in modeling and engineering metabolism. We present the first nonempirical computational method for estimating standard Gibbs reaction energies of metabolic reactions based on quantum chemistry, which can help fill in the gaps in the existing thermodynamic data. When applied to a test set of reactions from core metabolism, the quantum chemical approach is comparable in accuracy to group contribution methods for isomerization and group transfe...

Chemical and Biophysical Modulation of Cas9 for Tunable Genome Engineering.

Science.gov (United States)

Nuñez, James K; Harrington, Lucas B; Doudna, Jennifer A

2016-03-18

The application of the CRISPR-Cas9 system for genome engineering has revolutionized the ability to interrogate genomes of mammalian cells. Programming the Cas9 endonuclease to induce DNA breaks at specified sites is achieved by simply modifying the sequence of its cognate guide RNA. Although Cas9-mediated genome editing has been shown to be highly specific, cleavage events at off-target sites have also been reported. Minimizing, and eventually abolishing, unwanted off-target cleavage remains a major goal of the CRISPR-Cas9 technology before its implementation for therapeutic use. Recent efforts have turned to chemical biology and biophysical approaches to engineer inducible genome editing systems for controlling Cas9 activity at the transcriptional and protein levels. Here, we review recent advancements to modulate Cas9-mediated genome editing by engineering split-Cas9 constructs, inteins, small molecules, protein-based dimerizing domains, and light-inducible systems.

Chemical Engineering Education in a Bologna Three Cycle Degree System

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Gani, Rafiqul

For the purpose of harmonization of European higher education, Europe’s education system has been going through major changes under what is commonly known as the ”Bologna Process”. The Bologna declaration in 1999 was the start of the introduction of a three cycle degree system in higher education...... in Europe. To date, many European universities have adopted this degree structure. The Working Party on Education (WPE) of the European Federation of Chemical Engineering (EFCE) carried out research to determine the contents of higher education in chemical engineering (ChE) and related disciplines...... such as applied chemistry and process engineering throughout Europe. The result has been a set of recommendations for the first (BS), second (MS) and third (PhD) cycle chemical engineering education aligned to the Bologna Process. They recommend that students studying towards bachelor and masters qualifications...

Chemical engineering challenges and investment opportunities in sustainable energy.

Science.gov (United States)

Heller, Adam

2008-01-01

The chemical and energy industries are transforming as they adjust to the new era of high-priced petroleum and severe global warming. As a result of the transformation, engineering challenges and investment opportunities abound. Rapid evolution and fast growth are expected in cathode and anode materials as well as polymeric electrolytes for vehicular batteries and in high-performance polymer-ceramic composites for wind turbines, fuel-efficient aircraft, and lighter and safer cars. Unique process-engineering opportunities exist in sand-oil, coal, and possibly also shale liquefaction to produce transportation fuel; and also in genetic engineering of photosynthesizing plants and other organisms for their processing into high-performance biodegradable polymers and high-value-added environmentally friendly chemicals. Also, research on the feasibility of mitigation of global warming through enhancement of CO(2) uptake by the southern oceans by fertilization with trace amounts of iron is progressing. Because chemical engineers are uniquely well trained in mathematical modeling of mass transport, flow, and mixing, and also in cost analysis, they are likely to join the oceanographers and marine biologists in this important endeavor.

Showcasing Chemical Engineering Principles through the Production of Biodiesel from Spent Coffee Grounds

Science.gov (United States)

Bendall, Sophie; Birdsall-Wilson, Max; Jenkins, Rhodri; Chew, Y. M. John; Chuck, Christopher J.

2015-01-01

Chemical engineering is rarely encountered before higher-level education in the U.S. or in Europe, leaving prospective students unaware of what an applied chemistry or chemical engineering degree entails. In this lab experiment, we report the implementation of a three-day course to showcase chemical engineering principles for 16-17 year olds…

Discussion on the Development of Green Chemistry and Chemical Engineering

Science.gov (United States)

Zhang, Yunshen

2017-11-01

Chemical industry plays a vital role in the development process of national economy. However, in view of the special nature of the chemical industry, a large number of poisonous and harmful substances pose a great threat to the ecological environment and human health in the entire process of raw material acquisition, production, transportation, product manufacturing, and the final practical application. Therefore, it is a general trend to promote the development of chemistry and chemical engineering towards a greener environment. This article will focus on some basic problems occurred in the development process of green chemistry and chemical engineering.

A systems engineering approach to manage the complexity in sustainable chemical product-process design

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Gani, Rafiqul

This paper provides a perspective on model-data based solution approaches for chemical product-process design, which consists of finding the identity of the candidate chemical product, designing the process that can sustainably manufacture it and verifying the performance of the product during...... framework can manage the complexity associated with product-process problems very efficiently. Three specific computer-aided tools (ICAS, Sustain-Pro and VPPDLab) have been presented and their applications to product-process design, highlighted....

Thermodynamics an engineering approach

CERN Document Server

Cengel, Yunus A

2014-01-01

Thermodynamics, An Engineering Approach, eighth edition, covers the basic principles of thermodynamics while presenting a wealth of real-world engineering examples so students get a feel for how thermodynamics is applied in engineering practice. This text helps students develop an intuitive understanding by emphasizing the physics and physical arguments. Cengel and Boles explore the various facets of thermodynamics through careful explanations of concepts and use of numerous practical examples and figures, having students develop necessary skills to bridge the gap between knowledge and the confidence to properly apply their knowledge. McGraw-Hill is proud to offer Connect with the eighth edition of Cengel/Boles, Thermodynamics, An Engineering Approach. This innovative and powerful new system helps your students learn more efficiently and gives you the ability to assign homework problems simply and easily. Problems are graded automatically, and the results are recorded immediately. Track individual stude...

The role of chemical engineering in medicinal research including Alzheimer's.

Science.gov (United States)

Kontogeorgis, Georgios M

2015-01-01

Various disciplines of chemical engineering, especially thermodynamics and kinetics, play an important role in medicinal research and this has been particularly recognized during the last 10-15 years (von Stockar and van der Wielen, J Biotechnol 59:25, 1997; Prausnitz, Fluid Phase Equilib 53:439, 1989; Prausnitz, Pure Appl Chem 79:1435, 2007; Dey and Prausnitz, Ind Eng Chem Res 50:3, 2011; Prausnitz, J Chem Thermodynamics 35:21, 2003; Tsivintzelis et al. AIChE J 55:756, 2009). It is expected that during the twenty-first century chemical engineering and especially thermodynamics can contribute as significantly to the life sciences development as it has been done with the oil and gas and chemical sectors in the twentieth century. Moreover, it has during the recent years recognized that thermodynamics can help in understanding diseases like human cataract, sickle-cell anemia, Creuzfeldt-Jacob ("mad cow" disease), and Alzheimer's which are connected to "protein aggregation." Several articles in the Perspectives section of prominent chemical engineering journals have addressed this issue (Hall, AIChE J 54:1956, 2008; Vekilov, AIChE J 54:2508, 2008). This work reviews recent applications of thermodynamics (and other areas of chemical engineering) first in drug development and then in the understanding of the mechanism of Alzheimer's and similar diseases.

Environmental Engineering and Sustainable Development

OpenAIRE

Said Salah Eldin Elnashaie

2018-01-01

Chemical Engineering is a very rich discipline and it is best classified using System Theory (ST) and utilized using the Integrated System Approach (ISA). Environmental Engineering (EE) is a subsystem of Chemical Engineering and also a subsystem of Sustainable Development (SD). In this paper both EE and SD are discussed from a Chemical Engineering point of view utilizing ST and ISA.

Teaching chemical product design to engineering students: course contents and challenges

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Skov, Anne Ladegaard; Kiil, Søren

Chemical product design is not taught in the same way as traditional engineering courses like unit operations or transport phenomena. This paper gives an overview of the challenges that we, as teachers, have faced when teaching chemical product design to engineering students. Specific course...

Chemical Kinetic Models for Advanced Engine Combustion

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Pitz, William J. [Lawrence Livermore National Lab. (LLNL), Livermore, CA (United States); Mehl, Marco [Lawrence Livermore National Lab. (LLNL), Livermore, CA (United States); Westbrook, Charles K. [Lawrence Livermore National Lab. (LLNL), Livermore, CA (United States)

2014-10-22

The objectives for this project are as follows: Develop detailed chemical kinetic models for fuel components used in surrogate fuels for compression ignition (CI), homogeneous charge compression ignition (HCCI) and reactivity-controlled compression-ignition (RCCI) engines; and Combine component models into surrogate fuel models to represent real transportation fuels. Use them to model low-temperature combustion strategies in HCCI, RCCI, and CI engines that lead to low emissions and high efficiency.

Nonlinear approaches in engineering applications 2

CERN Document Server

Jazar, Reza N

2013-01-01

Provides updated principles and applications of the nonlinear approaches in solving engineering and physics problems Demonstrates how nonlinear approaches may open avenues to better, safer, cheaper systems with less energy consumption Has a strong emphasis on the application, physical meaning, and methodologies of nonlinear approaches in different engineering and science problems

MULTIDISCIPLINARY PROJECTS FOR SECOND YEAR CHEMICAL AND MECHANICAL ENGINEERING STUDENTS

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

MARWAN M. SHAMEL

2013-04-01

Full Text Available In the second semester of the second year of a Mechanical Engineering course, students are supposed to take a Module Outside the Main Discipline (MOMD. This module is chosen to be “Product Design Exercise” a module that is offered to Chemical Engineering students at the same stage. The aim was to expose students from both disciplines to an environment in which they are encouraged to interact with and engage team members with a relatively different background. The students were divided into eight groups all comprised of Chemical and Mechanical Engineering students, and they were offered different open-ended projects that were selected to exploit the knowledge developed by the students thus far and they were slightly skewed towards Chemical Engineering. The students demonstrated a high level of cooperation and motivation throughout the period of the project. Effective communication and closing of knowledge gaps were prevalent. At the end of the project period, students produced a journal paper in lieu of the project report.

Metabolic Engineering of Chemical Defence Pathways in Plant Disease Control

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Rook, Frederik

2016-01-01

on each topic. The chapter reviews the some of the scientific and technical challenges in metabolic engineering and the new possibilities emerging from recent technological developments. It concludes by discussing the outlook for bioengineered chemical defences as part of crop protection strategies, also...... with antimicrobial properties for use in crop protection. It presents an overview of the metabolic engineering efforts made in the area of plant chemical defence. For in-depth information on the characteristics of a specific class of chemical defence compounds, the reader is referred to the specialized reviews...

Appropriate Programs for Foreign Students in U.S. Chemical Engineering Curricula.

Science.gov (United States)

Findley, M. E.

Chemical engineers in developing countries may need abilities in a number of diverse areas including management, planning, chemistry, equipment, processes, politics, and improvisation. Chemical engineering programs for foreign students can be arranged by informed advisers with student input for inclusion of some of these areas in addition to…

Modular co-culture engineering, a new approach for metabolic engineering.

Science.gov (United States)

Zhang, Haoran; Wang, Xiaonan

2016-09-01

With the development of metabolic engineering, employment of a selected microbial host for accommodation of a designed biosynthetic pathway to produce a target compound has achieved tremendous success in the past several decades. Yet, increasing requirements for sophisticated microbial biosynthesis call for establishment and application of more advanced metabolic engineering methodologies. Recently, important progress has been made towards employing more than one engineered microbial strains to constitute synthetic co-cultures and modularizing the biosynthetic labor between the co-culture members in order to improve bioproduction performance. This emerging approach, referred to as modular co-culture engineering in this review, presents a valuable opportunity for expanding the scope of the broad field of metabolic engineering. We highlight representative research accomplishments using this approach, especially those utilizing metabolic engineering tools for microbial co-culture manipulation. Key benefits and major challenges associated with modular co-culture engineering are also presented and discussed. Copyright © 2016 International Metabolic Engineering Society. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Rethinking engineering education the CDIO approach

CERN Document Server

Crawley, Edward F; Östlund, Sören; Brodeur, Doris R; Edström, Kristina

2014-01-01

This book describes an approach to engineering education that integrates a comprehensive set of personal, interpersonal, and professional engineering skills with engineering disciplinary knowledge in order to prepare innovative and entrepreneurial engineers.  The education of engineers is set in the context of engineering practice, that is, Conceiving, Designing, Implementing, and Operating (CDIO) through the entire lifecycle of engineering processes, products, and systems. The book is both a description of the development and implementation of the CDIO model and a guide to engineering programs worldwide that seek to improve the education of young engineers.   Provides an overview of the CDIO approach, then chapters organized according to the CDIO Standards; Includes in each chapter objectives, discussion questions, case studies and clear diagrams to support key concepts and processes; Avoids the jargon of education specialists and clearly explains education terms in the context of their initial presentatio...

Assessing the Higher National Diploma Chemical Engineering programme in Ghana: students' perspective

Science.gov (United States)

Boateng, Cyril D.; Cudjoe Bensah, Edem; Ahiekpor, Julius C.

2012-05-01

Chemical engineers have played key roles in the growth of the chemical and allied industries in Ghana but indigenous industries that have traditionally been the domain of the informal sector need to be migrated to the formal sector through the entrepreneurship and innovation of chemical engineers. The Higher National Diploma Chemical Engineering programme is being migrated from a subject-based to a competency-based curriculum. This paper evaluates the programme from the point of view of students. Data were drawn from a survey conducted in the department and were analysed using SPSS. The survey involved administering questionnaires to students at all levels in the department. Analysis of the responses indicated that the majority of the students had decided to pursue chemical engineering due to the career opportunities available. Their knowledge of the programme learning outcomes was, however, poor. The study revealed that none of the students was interested in developing indigenous industries.

"Human Nature": Chemical Engineering Students' Ideas about Human Relationships with the Natural World

Science.gov (United States)

Goldman, Daphne; Assaraf, Orit Ben-Zvi; Shemesh, Julia

2014-01-01

While importance of environmental ethics, as a component of sustainable development, in preparing engineers is widely acknowledged, little research has addressed chemical engineers' environmental concerns. This study aimed to address this void by exploring chemical engineering students' values regarding human-nature relationships. The study was…

Curriculum Assessment as a Direct Tool in ABET Outcomes Assessment in a Chemical Engineering Programme

Science.gov (United States)

Abu-Jdayil, Basim; Al-Attar, Hazim

2010-01-01

The chemical engineering programme at the United Arab Emirates University is designed to fulfil the Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology (ABET) (A-K) EC2000 criteria. The Department of Chemical & Petroleum Engineering has established a well-defined process for outcomes assessment for the chemical engineering programme in order to…

Chemical engineering and thermodynamics using Mat lab

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Kim Heon; Kim, Moon Gap; Lee, Hak Yeong; Yeo, Yeong Gu; Ham, Seong Won

2002-02-01

This book consists of twelve chapters and four appendixes about chemical engineering and thermodynamics using Mat lab, which deals with introduction, energy budget, entropy, thermodynamics process, generalization on any fluid, engineering equation of state for PVT properties, deviation of the function, phase equilibrium of pure fluid, basic of multicomponent, phase equilibrium of compound by state equation, activity model and reaction system. The appendixes is about summary of computer program, related mathematical formula and material property of pure component.

Energy efficiency as an example of cross-discipline collaboration in chemical engineering

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

de Hemptinne, J.-C; Ferrasse, J.-H.; Górak, A.

2017-01-01

This paper summarizes the round-table discussion that was held during the European Congress of Chemical Engineering (ECCE) in Nice, France, in October 2015 on this topic. The panellists come from different fields of chemical engineering and have thus brought in different perspectives. The objective...... (industrials, mostly market-driven, or academic), or in terms of discipline. The role of professional societies as the European Federation for Chemical Engineers (EFCE) is stressed as a promotor of collaboration between disciplines.Finally, once willingness for collaboration is identified, the final question...

Guest Editorial: The Professional Status of European Chemists and Chemical Engineers.

Science.gov (United States)

Salzer, Reiner; Taylor, Philip; Majcen, Nineta H; De Angelis, Francesco; Wilmet, Sophie; Varella, Evangelia; Kozaris, Ioannis

2015-07-06

Which country pays its chemists and chemical engineers the highest salaries? Where can I find a new job quickest? Which chemical sub-discipline offers most jobs? Reliable answers for these and other questions have been derived from the first European employment survey for chemists and chemical engineers, which was carried out in 2013. Here we publish the first general evaluation of the results of this survey. © 2015 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.

My contribution to broadening the base of chemical engineering.

Science.gov (United States)

Sargent, Roger W H

2011-01-01

This paper is a short account, from a personal viewpoint, of the various contributions I have made to expand the academic basis of chemical engineering from its origin in the unifying concept of unit operations, focussed on process design, to encompassing all the professional activities of industrial chemical engineers. This includes all aspects of planning and scheduling the operations as well as designing and controlling the process plant. The span of my career also happens to include the birth of the age of computing, with all the consequential implications.

Engineering students' sustainability approaches

Science.gov (United States)

Haase, S.

2014-05-01

Sustainability issues are increasingly important in engineering work all over the world. This article explores systematic differences in self-assessed competencies, interests, importance, engagement and practices of newly enrolled engineering students in Denmark in relation to environmental and non-environmental sustainability issues. The empirical base of the article is a nation-wide, web-based survey sent to all newly enrolled engineering students in Denmark commencing their education in the fall term 2010. The response rate was 46%. The survey focused on a variety of different aspects of what can be conceived as sustainability. By means of cluster analysis, three engineering student approaches to sustainability are identified and described. The article provides knowledge on the different prerequisites of engineering students in relation to the role of sustainability in engineering. This information is important input to educators trying to target new engineering students and contribute to the provision of engineers equipped to meet sustainability challenges.

Designing Solutions by a Student Centred Approach: Integration of Chemical Process Simulation with Statistical Tools to Improve Distillation Systems

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Isabel M. Joao

2017-09-01

Full Text Available Projects thematically focused on simulation and statistical techniques for designing and optimizing chemical processes can be helpful in chemical engineering education in order to meet the needs of engineers. We argue for the relevance of the projects to improve a student centred approach and boost higher order thinking skills. This paper addresses the use of Aspen HYSYS by Portuguese chemical engineering master students to model distillation systems together with statistical experimental design techniques in order to optimize the systems highlighting the value of applying problem specific knowledge, simulation tools and sound statistical techniques. The paper summarizes the work developed by the students in order to model steady-state processes, dynamic processes and optimize the distillation systems emphasizing the benefits of the simulation tools and statistical techniques in helping the students learn how to learn. Students strengthened their domain specific knowledge and became motivated to rethink and improve chemical processes in their future chemical engineering profession. We discuss the main advantages of the methodology from the students’ and teachers perspective

Summaries of the 40. Scientific Assembly of Polish Chemical Society and Association of Engineers and Technicians of Chemical Industry

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

1997-01-01

Annual 40. Scientific Assembly of Polish Chemical Society and Association of Engineers and Technicians of Chemical Industry has been held in Gdansk on 22-26 September 1997. The most valuable scientific results obtained in Polish Laboratories have been presented in 22 main sections and 7 symposia directed especially at following subjects: analytical chemistry, biochemistry, solid state chemistry and material science, physical chemistry, heteroorganic and coordination chemistry, medical and pharmaceutical chemistry, metalorganic chemistry, inorganic and organic chemistry, polymers chemistry, chemistry and environment protection, theoretical chemistry, chemical didactics, photochemistry, radiation chemistry and chemical kinetics, chemical engineering, catalysis, crystallochemistry, chemical technology, electrochemistry, and instrumental methods

The Chemical Weapons Convention and the Role of Engineers and Scientists

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Matoušek, J

2010-02-01

Full Text Available Chemical weapons, like all military technology, are associated with activities of scientists and engineers. However, chemical weapons differ from any other military technology because they were invented, and their first mass use directly developed by famous chemists. The active contribution of engineers and scientists and their organisations in the negotiations on chemical disarmament, including drafting the Chemical Weapons Convention, is described. Their present and future role in implementing the Convention is analysed, taking into consideration the threats and benefits of advances in science and technology, and stressing the independent expertise of the OPCW Scientific Advisory Board.

Abstracts Book of 42. Scientific Assembly of Polish Chemical Society and Association of Engineers and Technicians of Chemical Industry

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

1999-01-01

Scientific Assembly of Polish Chemical Society and Association of Engineers and Technicians of Chemical Industry is the most important chemical forum of Polish chemists organised annually. The state of art of many fundamental and applied investigations have been presented and discussed. The following scientific sessions and microsymposia have been proposed: plenary session, analytical chemistry, inorganic chemistry, organic chemistry, chemistry and environment, chemistry and technology of polymers, chemistry didactics, electrochemistry, young scientists forum, chemical technology, chemical engineering, high energetics materials, computers in research and teaching of chemistry, structure modelling and polymer properties, silicon-organic compounds

Chemical engineering and chemistry : education in a changing world

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Reijenga, J.C.

2006-01-01

Current trends in science and engineering research are analyzed, together with an inventory of changes in the field of employment and practice in industry. The resulting demands on university education of chemists and chemical engineers have been translated into a more or less continuous updating of

Integrative Chemical-Biological Read-Across Approach for Chemical Hazard Classification

Science.gov (United States)

Low, Yen; Sedykh, Alexander; Fourches, Denis; Golbraikh, Alexander; Whelan, Maurice; Rusyn, Ivan; Tropsha, Alexander

2013-01-01

Traditional read-across approaches typically rely on the chemical similarity principle to predict chemical toxicity; however, the accuracy of such predictions is often inadequate due to the underlying complex mechanisms of toxicity. Here we report on the development of a hazard classification and visualization method that draws upon both chemical structural similarity and comparisons of biological responses to chemicals measured in multiple short-term assays (”biological” similarity). The Chemical-Biological Read-Across (CBRA) approach infers each compound's toxicity from those of both chemical and biological analogs whose similarities are determined by the Tanimoto coefficient. Classification accuracy of CBRA was compared to that of classical RA and other methods using chemical descriptors alone, or in combination with biological data. Different types of adverse effects (hepatotoxicity, hepatocarcinogenicity, mutagenicity, and acute lethality) were classified using several biological data types (gene expression profiling and cytotoxicity screening). CBRA-based hazard classification exhibited consistently high external classification accuracy and applicability to diverse chemicals. Transparency of the CBRA approach is aided by the use of radial plots that show the relative contribution of analogous chemical and biological neighbors. Identification of both chemical and biological features that give rise to the high accuracy of CBRA-based toxicity prediction facilitates mechanistic interpretation of the models. PMID:23848138

Applications of synchrotron radiation to Chemical Engineering Science: Workshop report

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

1991-07-01

This report contains extended abstracts that summarize presentations made at the Workshop on Applications of Synchrotron Radiation to Chemical Engineering Science held at Argonne National Laboratory (ANL), Argonne, IL, on April 22--23, 1991. The talks emphasized the application of techniques involving absorption fluorescence, diffraction, and reflection of synchrotron x-rays, with a focus on problems in applied chemistry and chemical engineering, as well as on the use of x-rays in topographic, tomographic, and lithographic procedures. The attendees at the workshop included experts in the field of synchrotron science, scientists and engineers from ANL, other national laboratories, industry, and universities; and graduate and undergraduate students who were enrolled in ANL educational programs at the time of the workshop. Talks in the Plenary and Overview Session described the status of and special capabilities to be offered by the Advanced Photon Source (APS), as well as strategies and opportunities for utilization of synchrotron radiation to solve science and engineering problems. Invited talks given in subsequent sessions covered the use of intense infrared, ultraviolet, and x-ray photon beams (as provided by synchrotrons) in traditional and nontraditional areas of chemical engineering research related to electrochemical and corrosion science, catalyst development and characterization, lithography and imaging techniques, and microanalysis

Applications of synchrotron radiation to Chemical Engineering Science: Workshop report

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

1991-07-01

This report contains extended abstracts that summarize presentations made at the Workshop on Applications of Synchrotron Radiation to Chemical Engineering Science held at Argonne National Laboratory (ANL), Argonne, IL, on April 22--23, 1991. The talks emphasized the application of techniques involving absorption fluorescence, diffraction, and reflection of synchrotron x-rays, with a focus on problems in applied chemistry and chemical engineering, as well as on the use of x-rays in topographic, tomographic, and lithographic procedures. The attendees at the workshop included experts in the field of synchrotron science, scientists and engineers from ANL, other national laboratories, industry, and universities; and graduate and undergraduate students who were enrolled in ANL educational programs at the time of the workshop. Talks in the Plenary and Overview Session described the status of and special capabilities to be offered by the Advanced Photon Source (APS), as well as strategies and opportunities for utilization of synchrotron radiation to solve science and engineering problems. Invited talks given in subsequent sessions covered the use of intense infrared, ultraviolet, and x-ray photon beams (as provided by synchrotrons) in traditional and nontraditional areas of chemical engineering research related to electrochemical and corrosion science, catalyst development and characterization, lithography and imaging techniques, and microanalysis.

Incorporating Six Sigma Methodology Training into Chemical Engineering Education

Science.gov (United States)

Dai, Lenore L.

2007-01-01

Six Sigma is a buzz term in today's technology and business world and there has been increasing interest to initiate Six Sigma training in college education. We have successfully incorporated Six Sigma methodology training into a traditional chemical engineering course, Engineering Experimentation, at Texas Tech University. The students have…

The history of Korean Institute Chemical Engineers for fifteen years

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

2012-12-01

This book reports the history of Korean Institute of Chemical Engineers with commemorative message, three congratulatory address and photos for fifty years. Nest, it consists of five chapters, which deals with development this institute by chronological classification. It reports the development history by activity such as education, research, publishing branch, international activity, data, woman, and executive office. It records challenge of chemical engineering, remembrance for past presidents and appendixes on history and a list of members.

The history of Korean Institute Chemical Engineers for fifteen years

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

NONE

2012-12-15

This book reports the history of Korean Institute of Chemical Engineers with commemorative message, three congratulatory address and photos for fifty years. Nest, it consists of five chapters, which deals with development this institute by chronological classification. It reports the development history by activity such as education, research, publishing branch, international activity, data, woman, and executive office. It records challenge of chemical engineering, remembrance for past presidents and appendixes on history and a list of members.

Method of operating a thermal engine powered by a chemical reaction

Science.gov (United States)

Ross, J.; Escher, C.

1988-06-07

The invention involves a novel method of increasing the efficiency of a thermal engine. Heat is generated by a non-linear chemical reaction of reactants, said heat being transferred to a thermal engine such as Rankine cycle power plant. The novel method includes externally perturbing one or more of the thermodynamic variables of said non-linear chemical reaction. 7 figs.

Design and Control of Chemical Grouting : Volume 3 - Engineering Practice

Science.gov (United States)

1983-04-01

Recent improvements in the engineering practice of chemical grouting have provided increased confidence in this method of ground modification. Designers can significantly improve the success of chemical grouting by defining their grouting program obj...

Expanding the chemical palate of cells by combining systems biology and metabolic engineering.

Science.gov (United States)

Curran, Kathleen A; Alper, Hal S

2012-07-01

The field of Metabolic Engineering has recently undergone a transformation that has led to a rapid expansion of the chemical palate of cells. Now, it is conceivable to produce nearly any organic molecule of interest using a cellular host. Significant advances have been made in the production of biofuels, biopolymers and precursors, pharmaceuticals and nutraceuticals, and commodity and specialty chemicals. Much of this rapid expansion in the field has been, in part, due to synergies and advances in the area of systems biology. Specifically, the availability of functional genomics, metabolomics and transcriptomics data has resulted in the potential to produce a wealth of new products, both natural and non-natural, in cellular factories. The sheer amount and diversity of this data however, means that uncovering and unlocking novel chemistries and insights is a non-obvious exercise. To address this issue, a number of computational tools and experimental approaches have been developed to help expedite the design process to create new cellular factories. This review will highlight many of the systems biology enabling technologies that have reduced the design cycle for engineered hosts, highlight major advances in the expanded diversity of products that can be synthesized, and conclude with future prospects in the field of metabolic engineering. Copyright © 2012 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

New Laboratory Course for Senior-Level Chemical Engineering Students

Science.gov (United States)

Aronson, Mark T.; Deitcher, Robert W.; Xi, Yuanzhou; Davis, Robert J.

2009-01-01

A new laboratory course has been developed at the University of Virginia for senior- level chemical engineering students. The new course is based on three 4-week long experiments in bioprocess engineering, energy conversion and catalysis, and polymer synthesis and characterization. The emphasis is on the integration of process steps and the…

Integrating chemical engineering fundamentals in the capstone process design project

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

von Solms, Nicolas; Woodley, John; Johnsson, Jan Erik

2010-01-01

Reaction Engineering. In order to incorporate reactor design into process design in a meaningful way, the teachers of the respective courses need to collaborate (Standard 9 – Enhancement of Faculty CDIO skills). The students also see that different components of the chemical engineering curriculum relate......All B.Eng. courses offered at the Technical University of Denmark (DTU) must now follow CDIO standards. The final “capstone” course in the B.Eng. education is Process Design, which for many years has been typical of chemical engineering curricula worldwide. The course at DTU typically has about 30...... of the CDIO standards – especially standard 3 – Integrated Curriculum - means that the course projects must draw on competences provided in other subjects which the students are taking in parallel with Process Design – specifically Process Control and Reaction Engineering. In each semester of the B...

Big Data Analytics in Chemical Engineering.

Science.gov (United States)

Chiang, Leo; Lu, Bo; Castillo, Ivan

2017-06-07

Big data analytics is the journey to turn data into insights for more informed business and operational decisions. As the chemical engineering community is collecting more data (volume) from different sources (variety), this journey becomes more challenging in terms of using the right data and the right tools (analytics) to make the right decisions in real time (velocity). This article highlights recent big data advancements in five industries, including chemicals, energy, semiconductors, pharmaceuticals, and food, and then discusses technical, platform, and culture challenges. To reach the next milestone in multiplying successes to the enterprise level, government, academia, and industry need to collaboratively focus on workforce development and innovation.

Introduction of Life Cycle Assessment and Sustainability Concepts in Chemical Engineering Curricula

Science.gov (United States)

Gallego-Schmid, Alejandro; Schmidt Rivera, Ximena C.; Stamford, Laurence

2018-01-01

Purpose: The implementation of life cycle assessment (LCA) and carbon footprinting represents an important professional and research opportunity for chemical engineers, but this is not broadly reflected in chemical engineering curricula worldwide. This paper aims to present the implementation of a coursework that is easy to apply, free of cost,…

CO{sub 2}-balance in the athmosphere and CO{sub 2}-utilisation : an engineering approach

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Turunen, H.

2012-07-01

The subject of the thesis was to analyze by an engineering approach the global CO{sub 2} balance and CO{sub 2} utilisation. The aim was to apply methods and knowledge used in engineering sciences to describe the global CO{sub 2} balance and the role of CO{sub 2} in anthropogenic utilisation applications. Moreover barriers restricting commercialisation of new applications are discussed. These subjects were studied by literature reviews and calculations based on thermodynamics models. Engineering methods have shown to be applicable to describe the global balance of CO{sub 2} and to define by a numerical way the Earth's system carrying capacity. Direct and indirect actions, which mitigate the overload situation, were derived from the results. To screen out the attractive CO{sub 2} properties in utilisation applications a mapping analysis was carried out. Properties, which enhance mass and heat transfer, are one of the most meaningful characteristics from the chemical engineering point of view. Attractive properties are often achieved at the supercritical state. Engineering thermodynamic methods were used in fluid phase determination of the case studies. Even simple methods are sufficient to advice experimental research work. The thermodynamic knowledge is the basement in creation of industrial scale chemical processes. If detailed information on system properties is needed, a model development due to the special requirements of high pressure systems and CO{sub 2} features is required. This knowledge covers property information from all the components involved in chemical reactions. In addition to engineering knowledge successful technology transfer requires positive social structure as well. Finally, if the humankind is willing to mimic Nature and use light of the Sun as an energy source in engineering systems, development of thermodynamic methods is required also in this area. Especially the work terms, originally defined in classical mechanical thermodynamics

Design and analysis of questionnaires for survey skills in chemical engineering

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Susana Lucas

2011-09-01

Full Text Available 800x600 Normal 0 21 false false false CA X-NONE X-NONE The new reorganization of university education has involved relevant changes in teaching and learning methodologies in order to help students to learn more effectively and to develop important skills and competences demanded by the professional world. In this sense the new configuration of the degree in Chemical Engineering required the identification of the main general and transferable skills, the implementation of the new teaching and learning strategies necessary to achieve them and, in addition, an evaluation procedure for determining the importance and the degree of development of a student´s skills and competences. In this exercise, two obligatory chemical reactor engineering subjects of the still in effect Chemical Engineering degree were chosen as examples of competence-based learning disciplines. For each one, a significant group of transferable and specific skills were selected to be developed. The identification and selection of skills was made according to the recommendations of the European Federation of Chemical Engineering (EFCE together with the established requirements in the ministerial order for the new Chemical Engineering Degree (Ministerial order CIN/351/2009. In order to check the effectiveness of teaching strategies in helping students to acquire these abilities, specific questionnaires were designed. These tests allowed for the utility of the competences in question to be evaluated in terms of the students´ professional work as future chemical engineering graduates and also facilitated the perception of skill development acquired through the methodology implemented in these subjects. The results of the skill evaluation questionnaires revealed the importance that both university collectives (students and professors give to the development of transferable skills. These skills included the ability to communicate effectively (including in English, to work in

2002 Chemical Engineering Division annual report

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Lewis, D.; Graziano, D.; Miller, J. F.

2003-01-01

The Chemical Engineering Division is one of eight engineering research divisions within Argonne National Laboratory, one of the U.S. government's oldest and largest research laboratories. The University of Chicago oversees the laboratory on behalf of the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE). Argonne's mission is to conduct basic scientific research, to operate national scientific facilities, to enhance the nation's energy resources, and to develop better ways to manage environmental problems. Argonne has the further responsibility of strengthening the nation's technology base by developing innovative technology and transferring it to industry. The Division is a diverse early-stage engineering organization, specializing in the treatment of spent nuclear fuel, development of advanced electrochemical power sources, and management of both high- and low-level nuclear wastes. Although this work is often indistinguishable from basic research, our efforts are directed toward the practical devices and processes that are covered by Argonne's mission. Additionally, the Division operates the Analytical Chemistry Laboratory; Environment, Safety, and Health Analytical Chemistry services; and Dosimetry and Radioprotection services, which provide a broad range of analytical services to Argonne and other organizations. The Division is multidisciplinary. Its people have formal training as ceramists; physicists; material scientists; electrical, mechanical, chemical, and nuclear engineers; and chemists. They have experience working in academia; urban planning; and the petroleum, aluminum, and automotive industries. Their skills include catalysis, ceramics, electrochemistry, metallurgy, nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy, and petroleum refining, as well as the development of nuclear waste forms, batteries, and high-temperature superconductors. Our wide-ranging expertise finds ready application in solving energy and environmental problems. Division personnel are frequently called on by

Abstracts Book of 41. Scientific Assembly of Polish Chemical Society and Association of Engineers and Technicians of Chemical Industry

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

1998-01-01

Scientific Assembly of Polish Chemical Society and Association of Engineers and Technicians of Chemical Industry is the most important scientific forum of Polish Chemists. The state of the art in many basic, fundamental and applied investigations has been presented and discussed. The following scientific sessions and microsymposia have been proposed: theoretical chemistry; molecular interactions; metal compounds - chemical, physical, electronic and biological aspects; catalysis and surface physico-chemistry; polymers - radiochemistry, modifications, physics and analytical methods; organic and bioorganic chemistry; physico-chemistry of condensed matter; chemical metallurgy; environmental protection; inorganic technology; chemistry and technology of coal; radiation chemistry; analytical chemistry; chemical engineering; young scientists forum; chemical didactics; petrochemistry; energetic materials; membranes and membrane processes; medical chemistry

A numerical primer for the chemical engineer

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Zondervan, E.

2015-01-01

This book provides an introduction to numerical methods for students in chemical engineering. The book starts with a recap on linear algebra. It then presents methods for solving linear and nonlinear equations, with a special focus on Gaussian elimination and Newton’s method. It also discusses

Two-Compartment Pharmacokinetic Models for Chemical Engineers

Science.gov (United States)

Kanneganti, Kumud; Simon, Laurent

2011-01-01

The transport of potassium permanganate between two continuous-stirred vessels was investigated to help chemical and biomedical engineering students understand two-compartment pharmacokinetic models. Concepts of modeling, mass balance, parameter estimation and Laplace transform were applied to the two-unit process. A good agreement was achieved…

Problem-based learning biotechnology courses in chemical engineering.

Science.gov (United States)

Glatz, Charles E; Gonzalez, Ramon; Huba, Mary E; Mallapragada, Surya K; Narasimhan, Balaji; Reilly, Peter J; Saunders, Kevin P; Shanks, Jacqueline V

2006-01-01

We have developed a series of upper undergraduate/graduate lecture and laboratory courses on biotechnological topics to supplement existing biochemical engineering, bioseparations, and biomedical engineering lecture courses. The laboratory courses are based on problem-based learning techniques, featuring two- and three-person teams, journaling, and performance rubrics for guidance and assessment. Participants initially have found them to be difficult, since they had little experience with problem-based learning. To increase enrollment, we are combining the laboratory courses into 2-credit groupings and allowing students to substitute one of them for the second of our 2-credit chemical engineering unit operations laboratory courses.

Drug Transport and Pharmacokinetics for Chemical Engineers

Science.gov (United States)

Simon, Laurent; Kanneganti, Kumud; Kim, Kwang Seok

2010-01-01

Experiments in continuous-stirred vessels were proposed to introduce methods in pharmacokinetics and drug transport to chemical engineering students. The activities can be incorporated into the curriculum to illustrate fundamentals learned in the classroom. An appreciation for the role of pharmacokinetics in drug discovery will also be gained…

Thought-evoking approaches in engineering problems

CERN Document Server

2014-01-01

In creating the value-added product in not distant future, it is necessary and inevitable to establish a holistic and though-evoking approach to the engineering problem, which should be at least associated with the inter-disciplinary knowledge and thought processes across the whole engineering spheres. It is furthermore desirable to integrate it with trans-disciplinary aspects ranging from manufacturing culture, through liberal-arts engineering, and industrial sociology.   The thought-evoking approach can be exemplified and typified by representative engineering problems: unveiling essential features in ‘Tangential Force Ratio and Interface Pressure’, prototype development for ‘Bio-mimetic Needle’ and application of ‘Water-jet Machining to Artificial Hip Joint’, product innovation in ‘Heat Sink for Computer’, application of ‘Graph Theory’ to similarity evaluation of production systems, leverage among reciprocity attributes in ‘Industrial and Engineering Designs for Machine Enclosure’,...

Engineering Education: Environmental and Chemical Engineering or Technology Curricula--A European Perspective

Science.gov (United States)

Glavic, Peter; Lukman, Rebeka; Lozano, Rodrigo

2009-01-01

Over recent years, universities have been incorporating sustainable development (SD) into their systems, including their curricula. This article analyses the incorporation of SD into the curricula of chemical and environmental engineering or technology bachelor degrees at universities in the European Union (EU) and European Free Trade Association…

Metabolic Engineering for Production of Biorenewable Fuels and Chemicals: Contributions of Synthetic Biology

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Laura R. Jarboe

2010-01-01

Full Text Available Production of fuels and chemicals through microbial fermentation of plant material is a desirable alternative to petrochemical-based production. Fermentative production of biorenewable fuels and chemicals requires the engineering of biocatalysts that can quickly and efficiently convert sugars to target products at a cost that is competitive with existing petrochemical-based processes. It is also important that biocatalysts be robust to extreme fermentation conditions, biomass-derived inhibitors, and their target products. Traditional metabolic engineering has made great advances in this area, but synthetic biology has contributed and will continue to contribute to this field, particularly with next-generation biofuels. This work reviews the use of metabolic engineering and synthetic biology in biocatalyst engineering for biorenewable fuels and chemicals production, such as ethanol, butanol, acetate, lactate, succinate, alanine, and xylitol. We also examine the existing challenges in this area and discuss strategies for improving biocatalyst tolerance to chemical inhibitors.

Optimal control for chemical engineers

CERN Document Server

Upreti, Simant Ranjan

2013-01-01

Optimal Control for Chemical Engineers gives a detailed treatment of optimal control theory that enables readers to formulate and solve optimal control problems. With a strong emphasis on problem solving, the book provides all the necessary mathematical analyses and derivations of important results, including multiplier theorems and Pontryagin's principle.The text begins by introducing various examples of optimal control, such as batch distillation and chemotherapy, and the basic concepts of optimal control, including functionals and differentials. It then analyzes the notion of optimality, de

Combining chemoinformatics with bioinformatics: in silico prediction of bacterial flavor-forming pathways by a chemical systems biology approach "reverse pathway engineering".

Science.gov (United States)

Liu, Mengjin; Bienfait, Bruno; Sacher, Oliver; Gasteiger, Johann; Siezen, Roland J; Nauta, Arjen; Geurts, Jan M W

2014-01-01

The incompleteness of genome-scale metabolic models is a major bottleneck for systems biology approaches, which are based on large numbers of metabolites as identified and quantified by metabolomics. Many of the revealed secondary metabolites and/or their derivatives, such as flavor compounds, are non-essential in metabolism, and many of their synthesis pathways are unknown. In this study, we describe a novel approach, Reverse Pathway Engineering (RPE), which combines chemoinformatics and bioinformatics analyses, to predict the "missing links" between compounds of interest and their possible metabolic precursors by providing plausible chemical and/or enzymatic reactions. We demonstrate the added-value of the approach by using flavor-forming pathways in lactic acid bacteria (LAB) as an example. Established metabolic routes leading to the formation of flavor compounds from leucine were successfully replicated. Novel reactions involved in flavor formation, i.e. the conversion of alpha-hydroxy-isocaproate to 3-methylbutanoic acid and the synthesis of dimethyl sulfide, as well as the involved enzymes were successfully predicted. These new insights into the flavor-formation mechanisms in LAB can have a significant impact on improving the control of aroma formation in fermented food products. Since the input reaction databases and compounds are highly flexible, the RPE approach can be easily extended to a broad spectrum of applications, amongst others health/disease biomarker discovery as well as synthetic biology.

Interactive Mathematica Simulations in Chemical Engineering Courses

Science.gov (United States)

Falconer, John L.; Nicodemus, Garret D.

2014-01-01

Interactive Mathematica simulations with graphical displays of system behavior are an excellent addition to chemical engineering courses. The Manipulate command in Mathematica creates on-screen controls that allow users to change system variables and see the graphical output almost instantaneously. They can be used both in and outside class. More…

Building an Evaluation Strategy for an Integrated Curriculum in Chemical Engineering

Science.gov (United States)

McCarthy, Joseph J.; Parker, Robert S.; Abatan, Adetola; Besterfield-Sacre, Mary

2011-01-01

Increasing knowledge integration has gained wide-spread support as an important goal in engineering education. The Chemical Engineering Pillars curriculum at the University of Pittsburgh, unique for its use of block scheduling, is one of the first four-year, integrated curricula in engineering, and is specifically designed to facilitate knowledge…

Recent advances in microbial production of fuels and chemicals using tools and strategies of systems metabolic engineering

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Cho, Changhee; Choi, So Young; Luo, Zi Wei

2015-01-01

The advent of various systems metabolic engineering tools and strategies has enabled more sophisticated engineering of microorganisms for the production of industrially useful fuels and chemicals. Advances in systems metabolic engineering have been made in overproducing natural chemicals...... and producing novel non-natural chemicals. In this paper, we review the tools and strategies of systems metabolic engineering employed for the development of microorganisms for the production of various industrially useful chemicals belonging to fuels, building block chemicals, and specialty chemicals......, in particular focusing on those reported in the last three years. It was aimed at providing the current landscape of systems metabolic engineering and suggesting directions to address future challenges towards successfully establishing processes for the bio-based production of fuels and chemicals from renewable...

Integrating the protein and metabolic engineering toolkits for next-generation chemical biosynthesis.

Science.gov (United States)

Pirie, Christopher M; De Mey, Marjan; Jones Prather, Kristala L; Ajikumar, Parayil Kumaran

2013-04-19

Through microbial engineering, biosynthesis has the potential to produce thousands of chemicals used in everyday life. Metabolic engineering and synthetic biology are fields driven by the manipulation of genes, genetic regulatory systems, and enzymatic pathways for developing highly productive microbial strains. Fundamentally, it is the biochemical characteristics of the enzymes themselves that dictate flux through a biosynthetic pathway toward the product of interest. As metabolic engineers target sophisticated secondary metabolites, there has been little recognition of the reduced catalytic activity and increased substrate/product promiscuity of the corresponding enzymes compared to those of central metabolism. Thus, fine-tuning these enzymatic characteristics through protein engineering is paramount for developing high-productivity microbial strains for secondary metabolites. Here, we describe the importance of protein engineering for advancing metabolic engineering of secondary metabolism pathways. This pathway integrated enzyme optimization can enhance the collective toolkit of microbial engineering to shape the future of chemical manufacturing.

Under pressure: evolutionary engineering of yeast strains for improved performance in fuels and chemicals production.

Science.gov (United States)

Mans, Robert; Daran, Jean-Marc G; Pronk, Jack T

2018-04-01

Evolutionary engineering, which uses laboratory evolution to select for industrially relevant traits, is a popular strategy in the development of high-performing yeast strains for industrial production of fuels and chemicals. By integrating whole-genome sequencing, bioinformatics, classical genetics and genome-editing techniques, evolutionary engineering has also become a powerful approach for identification and reverse engineering of molecular mechanisms that underlie industrially relevant traits. New techniques enable acceleration of in vivo mutation rates, both across yeast genomes and at specific loci. Recent studies indicate that phenotypic trade-offs, which are often observed after evolution under constant conditions, can be mitigated by using dynamic cultivation regimes. Advances in research on synthetic regulatory circuits offer exciting possibilities to extend the applicability of evolutionary engineering to products of yeasts whose synthesis requires a net input of cellular energy. Copyright © 2017 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.. All rights reserved.

Chemistry of fossil fuels and biofuels (cambridge series in chemical engineering)

CERN Document Server

Schobert, Harold

2013-01-01

Focusing on today's major fuel resources - ethanol, biodiesel, wood, natural gas, petroleum products and coal - this book discusses the formation, composition and properties of the fuels, and the ways in which they are processed for commercial use. The book examines the origin of fuels through natural processes such as photosynthesis and the geological transformation of ancient plant material; the relationships between their composition, molecular structures, and physical properties; and the various processes by which they are converted or refined into the fuel products appearing on today's market. Fundamental chemical aspects such as catalysis and the behaviour of reactive intermediates are presented, and global warming and anthropogenic carbon dioxide emissions are also discussed. The book is suitable for graduate students in energy engineering, chemical engineering, mechanical engineering and chemistry, as well as professional scientists and engineers.

Centrifugal Pump Experiment for Chemical Engineering Undergraduates

Science.gov (United States)

Vanderslice, Nicholas; Oberto, Richard; Marrero, Thomas R.

2012-01-01

The purpose of this paper is to describe a Centrifugal Pump Experiment that provided an experiential learning experience to chemical engineering undergraduates at the University of Missouri in the spring of 2010 in the Unit Operations Laboratory course. Lab equipment was used by senior students with computer-based data and control technology. In…

Chemical and Enzymatic Strategies for Bacterial and Mammalian Cell Surface Engineering.

Science.gov (United States)

Bi, Xiaobao; Yin, Juan; Chen Guanbang, Ashley; Liu, Chuan-Fa

2018-06-07

The cell surface serves important functions such as the regulation of cell-cell and cell-environment interactions. The understanding and manipulation of the cell surface is important for a wide range of fundamental studies of cellular behavior and for biotechnological and medical applications. With the rapid advance of biology, chemistry and materials science, many strategies have been developed for the functionalization of bacterial and mammalian cell surfaces. Here, we review the recent development of chemical and enzymatic approaches to cell surface engineering with particular emphasis on discussing the advantages and limitations of each of these strategies. © 2018 Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.

Genetic engineering and chemical conjugation of potato virus X.

Science.gov (United States)

Lee, Karin L; Uhde-Holzem, Kerstin; Fischer, Rainer; Commandeur, Ulrich; Steinmetz, Nicole F

2014-01-01

Here we report the genetic engineering and chemical modification of potato virus X (PVX) for the presentation of various peptides, proteins, and fluorescent dyes, or other chemical modifiers. Three different ways of genetic engineering are described and by these means, peptides are successfully expressed not only when the foot and mouth disease virus (FMDV) 2A sequence or a flexible glycine-serine linker is included, but also when the peptide is fused directly to the PVX coat protein. When larger proteins or unfavorable peptide sequences are presented, a partial fusion via the FMDV 2A sequence is preferable. When these PVX chimeras retain the ability to assemble into viral particles and are thus able to infect plants systemically, they can be utilized to inoculate susceptible plants for isolation of sufficient amounts of virus particles for subsequent chemical modification. Chemical modification is required for the display of nonbiological ligands such as fluorophores, polymers, and small drug compounds. We present three methods of chemical bioconjugation. For direct conjugation of small chemical modifiers to solvent exposed lysines, N-hydroxysuccinimide chemistry can be applied. Bio-orthogonal reactions such as copper-catalyzed azide-alkyne cycloaddition or hydrazone ligation are alternatives to achieve more efficient conjugation (e.g., when working with high molecular weight or insoluble ligands). Furthermore, hydrazone ligation offers an attractive route for the introduction of pH-cleavable cargos (e.g., therapeutic molecules).

Design Approaches to Myocardial and Vascular Tissue Engineering.

Science.gov (United States)

Akintewe, Olukemi O; Roberts, Erin G; Rim, Nae-Gyune; Ferguson, Michael A H; Wong, Joyce Y

2017-06-21

Engineered tissues represent an increasingly promising therapeutic approach for correcting structural defects and promoting tissue regeneration in cardiovascular diseases. One of the challenges associated with this approach has been the necessity for the replacement tissue to promote sufficient vascularization to maintain functionality after implantation. This review highlights a number of promising prevascularization design approaches for introducing vasculature into engineered tissues. Although we focus on encouraging blood vessel formation within myocardial implants, we also discuss techniques developed for other tissues that could eventually become relevant to engineered cardiac tissues. Because the ultimate solution to engineered tissue vascularization will require collaboration between wide-ranging disciplines such as developmental biology, tissue engineering, and computational modeling, we explore contributions from each field.

The role of chemical engineering in medicinal research including Alzheimer’s

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Kontogeorgis, Georgios M.

2015-01-01

Various disciplines of chemical engineering, especially thermodynamics and kinetics, play an important role in medicinal research and this has been particularly recognized during the last 10–15 years (von Stockar and van der Wielen, J Biotechnol 59:25, 1997; Prausnitz, Fluid Phase Equilib 53......:439, 1989; Prausnitz, Pure Appl Chem 79:1435, 2007; Dey and Prausnitz, Ind Eng Chem Res 50:3, 2011; Prausnitz, J Chem Thermodynamics 35:21, 2003; Tsivintzelis et al. AIChE J 55:756, 2009). It is expected that during the twenty-first century chemical engineering and especially thermodynamics can contribute......” disease), and Alzheimer’s which are connected to “protein aggregation.” Several articles in the Perspectives section of prominent chemical engineering journals have addressed this issue (Hall, AIChE J 54:1956, 2008; Vekilov, AIChE J 54:2508, 2008). This work reviews recent applications of thermodynamics...

Recent advances in microbial production of fuels and chemicals using tools and strategies of systems metabolic engineering.

Science.gov (United States)

Cho, Changhee; Choi, So Young; Luo, Zi Wei; Lee, Sang Yup

2015-11-15

The advent of various systems metabolic engineering tools and strategies has enabled more sophisticated engineering of microorganisms for the production of industrially useful fuels and chemicals. Advances in systems metabolic engineering have been made in overproducing natural chemicals and producing novel non-natural chemicals. In this paper, we review the tools and strategies of systems metabolic engineering employed for the development of microorganisms for the production of various industrially useful chemicals belonging to fuels, building block chemicals, and specialty chemicals, in particular focusing on those reported in the last three years. It was aimed at providing the current landscape of systems metabolic engineering and suggesting directions to address future challenges towards successfully establishing processes for the bio-based production of fuels and chemicals from renewable resources. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Unifying principles of irreversibility minimization for efficiency maximization in steady-flow chemically-reactive engines

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Ramakrishnan, Sankaran; Edwards, Christopher F.

2014-01-01

Systems research has led to the conception and development of various steady-flow, chemically-reactive, engine cycles for stationary power generation and propulsion. However, the question that remains unanswered is: What is the maximum-efficiency steady-flow chemically-reactive engine architecture permitted by physics? On the one hand the search for higher-efficiency cycles continues, often involving newer processes and devices (fuel cells, carbon separation, etc.); on the other hand the design parameters for existing cycles are continually optimized in response to improvements in device engineering. In this paper we establish that any variation in engine architecture—parametric change or process-sequence change—contributes to an efficiency increase via one of only two possible ways to minimize total irreversibility. These two principles help us unify our understanding from a large number of parametric analyses and cycle-optimization studies for any steady-flow chemically-reactive engine, and set a framework to systematically identify maximum-efficiency engine architectures. - Highlights: • A unified thermodynamic model to study chemically-reactive engine architectures is developed. • All parametric analyses of efficiency are unified by two irreversibility-minimization principles. • Variations in internal energy transfers yield a net work increase that is greater than engine irreversibility reduced. • Variations in external energy transfers yield a net work increase that is lesser than engine irreversibility reduced

A Chemical Engineering Perspective on the Origins of Life

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Martha A. Grover

2015-05-01

Full Text Available Atoms and molecules assemble into materials, with the material structure determining the properties and ultimate function. Human-made materials and systems have achieved great complexity, such as the integrated circuit and the modern airplane. However, they still do not rival the adaptivity and robustness of biological systems. Understanding the reaction and assembly of molecules on the early Earth is a scientific grand challenge, and also can elucidate the design principles underlying biological materials and systems. This research requires understanding of chemical reactions, thermodynamics, fluid mechanics, heat and mass transfer, optimization, and control. Thus, the discipline of chemical engineering can play a central role in advancing the field. In this paper, an overview of research in the origins field is given, with particular emphasis on the origin of biopolymers and the role of chemical engineering phenomena. A case study is presented to highlight the importance of the environment and its coupling to the chemistry.

An Alternative Route to Chemical Engineering for Minority and Other Students.

Science.gov (United States)

Cussler, E. L.

The following three alternative ways in which minority group chemistry majors may be trained as chemical engineers are examined in this paper: (l) they are admitted as engineers and take the same courses as engineering students at the graduate level; (2) undergraduate courses are taken as part of the transition from chemistry to chemical…

The Chemical Engineering behind How Carbonated Beverages Go Flat: A Hands-On Experiment for Freshmen Students

Science.gov (United States)

Hohn, Keith L.

2007-01-01

A hands-on project was developed to educate new chemical engineering students about the types of problems chemical engineers solve and to improve student enthusiasm for studying chemical engineering. In this project, students studied the phenomenon of carbonated beverages going flat. The project was implemented in 2003 and 2004 at Kansas State…

Cyanobacterial chassis engineering for enhancing production of biofuels and chemicals.

Science.gov (United States)

Gao, Xinyan; Sun, Tao; Pei, Guangsheng; Chen, Lei; Zhang, Weiwen

2016-04-01

To reduce dependence on fossil fuels and curb greenhouse effect, cyanobacteria have emerged as an important chassis candidate for producing biofuels and chemicals due to their capability to directly utilize sunlight and CO2 as the sole energy and carbon sources, respectively. Recent progresses in developing and applying various synthetic biology tools have led to the successful constructions of novel pathways of several dozen green fuels and chemicals utilizing cyanobacterial chassis. Meanwhile, it is increasingly recognized that in order to enhance productivity of the synthetic cyanobacterial systems, optimizing and engineering more robust and high-efficient cyanobacterial chassis should not be omitted. In recent years, numerous research studies have been conducted to enhance production of green fuels and chemicals through cyanobacterial chassis modifications involving photosynthesis, CO2 uptake and fixation, products exporting, tolerance, and cellular regulation. In this article, we critically reviewed recent progresses and universal strategies in cyanobacterial chassis engineering to make it more robust and effective for bio-chemicals production.

Engineering propionibacteria as versatile cell factories for the production of industrially important chemicals: advances, challenges, and prospects.

Science.gov (United States)

Guan, Ningzi; Zhuge, Xin; Li, Jianghua; Shin, Hyun-Dong; Wu, Jing; Shi, Zhongping; Liu, Long

2015-01-01

Propionibacteria are actinobacteria consisting of two principal groups: cutaneous and dairy. Cutaneous propionibacteria are considered primary pathogens to humans, whereas dairy propionibacteria are widely used in the food and pharmaceutical industries. Increasing attention has been focused on improving the performance of dairy propionibacteria for the production of industrially important chemicals, and significant advances have been made through strain engineering and process optimization in the production of flavor compounds, nutraceuticals, and antimicrobial compounds. In addition, genome sequencing of several propionibacteria species has been completed, deepening understanding of the metabolic and physiological features of these organisms. However, the metabolic engineering of propionibacteria still faces several challenges owing to the lack of efficient genome manipulation tools and the existence of various types of strong restriction-modification systems. The emergence of systems and synthetic biology provides new opportunities to overcome these bottlenecks. In this review, we first introduce the major species of propionibacteria and their properties and provide an overview of their functions and applications. We then discuss advances in the genome sequencing and metabolic engineering of these bacteria. Finally, we discuss systems and synthetic biology approaches for engineering propionibacteria as efficient and robust cell factories for the production of industrially important chemicals.

Incorporating Sustainability into Engineering and Chemical Education Using E-Learning

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Edmond Sanganyado

2018-03-01

Full Text Available The purpose of this study was to develop e-learning activities that could facilitate the integration of sustainability concepts and practices in engineering and chemical education. Using an online learning management system (LMS, undergraduate students in an applied chemistry program at a public university in Zimbabwe participated in an online discussion on the role of chemical reaction engineering in achieving environmental sustainability goals. In the second activity, the students were instructed to prepare a design report for a cost-effective and innovative wastewater treatment plant for a rural hospital. The design report was evaluated through peer review online. Quantitative and qualitative analyses were performed on the two online activities to evaluate student engagement, quality of responses and the incorporation of sustainability into their learning. In the online discussion, 97 comments were made averaging 120 words per comment. Furthermore, the students averaged 3.88 comments, with the majority of comments exhibiting simple and complex argumentation, a deep reflection and widespread use of terms associated with sustainability such as recycling, pollution, waste and the environment. Furthermore, the evaluation of peer reviews revealed that participants demonstrated they could identify the strengths and shortcomings in the design reports. Therefore, this study demonstrated that e-learning, particularly peer review and online discussion, could help chemistry and engineering students appreciate the need for chemical and engineering activities that encourage sustainable development.

Externally heated valve engine a new approach to piston engines

CERN Document Server

Kazimierski, Zbyszko

2016-01-01

This book reports on a novel approach for generating mechanical energy from different, external heat sources using the body of a typical piston engine with valves. By presenting simple yet effective numerical models, the authors show how this new approach, which combines existing internal combustion technology with a lubrication system, is able to offer an economic solution to the problem of mechanical energy generation in piston engines. Their results also show that a stable heat generation process can be guaranteed outside of the engine. The book offers a detailed report on physical and numerical models of 4-stroke and 2-stroke versions of the EHVE together with different models of heat exchange, valves and results of their simulations. It also delivers the test results of an engine prototype run in laboratory conditions. By presenting a novel theoretical framework and providing readers with extensive knowledge of both the advantages and challenges of the method, this book is expected to inspire academic re...

Chemical genomic guided engineering of gamma-valerolactone tolerant yeast.

Science.gov (United States)

Bottoms, Scott; Dickinson, Quinn; McGee, Mick; Hinchman, Li; Higbee, Alan; Hebert, Alex; Serate, Jose; Xie, Dan; Zhang, Yaoping; Coon, Joshua J; Myers, Chad L; Landick, Robert; Piotrowski, Jeff S

2018-01-12

Gamma valerolactone (GVL) treatment of lignocellulosic bomass is a promising technology for degradation of biomass for biofuel production; however, GVL is toxic to fermentative microbes. Using a combination of chemical genomics with the yeast (Saccharomyces cerevisiae) deletion collection to identify sensitive and resistant mutants, and chemical proteomics to monitor protein abundance in the presence of GVL, we sought to understand the mechanism toxicity and resistance to GVL with the goal of engineering a GVL-tolerant, xylose-fermenting yeast. Chemical genomic profiling of GVL predicted that this chemical affects membranes and membrane-bound processes. We show that GVL causes rapid, dose-dependent cell permeability, and is synergistic with ethanol. Chemical genomic profiling of GVL revealed that deletion of the functionally related enzymes Pad1p and Fdc1p, which act together to decarboxylate cinnamic acid and its derivatives to vinyl forms, increases yeast tolerance to GVL. Further, overexpression of Pad1p sensitizes cells to GVL toxicity. To improve GVL tolerance, we deleted PAD1 and FDC1 in a xylose-fermenting yeast strain. The modified strain exhibited increased anaerobic growth, sugar utilization, and ethanol production in synthetic hydrolysate with 1.5% GVL, and under other conditions. Chemical proteomic profiling of the engineered strain revealed that enzymes involved in ergosterol biosynthesis were more abundant in the presence of GVL compared to the background strain. The engineered GVL strain contained greater amounts of ergosterol than the background strain. We found that GVL exerts toxicity to yeast by compromising cellular membranes, and that this toxicity is synergistic with ethanol. Deletion of PAD1 and FDC1 conferred GVL resistance to a xylose-fermenting yeast strain by increasing ergosterol accumulation in aerobically grown cells. The GVL-tolerant strain fermented sugars in the presence of GVL levels that were inhibitory to the unmodified strain

Chemical Reaction Engineering: Current Status and Future Directions.

Science.gov (United States)

Dudukovic, M. P.

1987-01-01

Describes Chemical Reaction Engineering (CRE) as the discipline that quantifies the interplay of transport phenomena and kinetics in relating reactor performance to operating conditions and input variables. Addresses the current status of CRE in both academic and industrial settings and outlines future trends. (TW)

Chemical composition and photochemical reactivity of exhaust from aircraft turbine engines

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

C. W. Spicer

1994-08-01

Full Text Available Assessment of the environmental impact of aircraft emissions is required by planners and policy makers. Seveal areas of concern are: 1. exposure of airport workers and urban residents to toxic chemicals emitted when the engines operate at low power (idle and taxi on the ground; 2. contributions to urban photochemical air pollution of aircraft volatile organic and nitrogen oxides emissions from operations around airports; and 3. emissions of nitrogen oxides and particles during high-altitude operation. The environmental impact of chemicals emitted from jet aircraft turbine engines has not been firmly established due to lack of data regarding emission rates and identities of the compounds emitted. This paper describes an experimental study of two different aircraft turbine engines designed to determine detailed organic emissions, as well as emissions of inorganic gases. Emissions were measured at several engine power settings. Measurements were made of detailed organic composition from C1 through C17, CO, CO2, NO, NOx, and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons. Measurements were made using a multi-port sampling pro be positioned directly behind the engine in the exhaust exit plane. The emission measurements have been used to determine the organic distribution by carbon number and the distribution by compound class at each engine power level. The sum of the organic species was compared with an independent measurement of total organic carbon to assess the carbon mass balance. A portion of the exhaust was captured and irradiated in outdoor smog chambers to assess the photochemical reactivity of the emissions with respect to ozone formation. The reactivity of emissions from the two engines was apportioned by chemical compound class.

An ontological approach to domain engineering

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Falbo, R.A.; Guizzardi, G.; Duarte, K.

2002-01-01

Domain engineering aims to support systematic reuse, focusing on modeling common knowledge in a problem domain. Ontologies have also been pointed as holding great promise for software reuse. In this paper, we present ODE (Ontology-based Domain Engineering), an ontological approach for domain

Combining engineering and data-driven approaches

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Fischer, Katharina; De Sanctis, Gianluca; Kohler, Jochen

2015-01-01

Two general approaches may be followed for the development of a fire risk model: statistical models based on observed fire losses can support simple cost-benefit studies but are usually not detailed enough for engineering decision-making. Engineering models, on the other hand, require many assump...... to the calibration of a generic fire risk model for single family houses to Swiss insurance data. The example demonstrates that the bias in the risk estimation can be strongly reduced by model calibration.......Two general approaches may be followed for the development of a fire risk model: statistical models based on observed fire losses can support simple cost-benefit studies but are usually not detailed enough for engineering decision-making. Engineering models, on the other hand, require many...... assumptions that may result in a biased risk assessment. In two related papers we show how engineering and data-driven modelling can be combined by developing generic risk models that are calibrated to statistical data on observed fire events. The focus of the present paper is on the calibration procedure...

Military Engineers and Chemical Warfare Troops (Inzhenernye Voiska Khimicheskie Voiska),

Science.gov (United States)

MILITARY FORCES(FOREIGN), *MILITARY ORGANIZATIONS, MILITARY ENGINEERING , INFANTRY, AMPHIBIOUS OPERATIONS, MINELAYING, ARMORED VEHICLES, NUCLEAR...RADIATION, DOSIMETERS, CHEMICAL WARFARE, PROTECTIVE CLOTHING, DECONTAMINATION, HEALTH PHYSICS.

Chemical Information in Scirus and BASE (Bielefeld Academic Search Engine)

Science.gov (United States)

Bendig, Regina B.

2009-01-01

The author sought to determine to what extent the two search engines, Scirus and BASE (Bielefeld Academic Search Engines), would be useful to first-year university students as the first point of searching for chemical information. Five topics were searched and the first ten records of each search result were evaluated with regard to the type of…

selectivity engineering in sustainable production of chemicals, fuels ...

Indian Academy of Sciences (India)

admin

Cost. Landfill. –400. Source: Tuck et al., Science, 337 (6095): 695-699 10 August ... libraries for novel enzymes that transform lignocellulosics ... Bio-process engineering for optimal production of ... fine chemicals and petrochemical industries. ..... Mole ratio : Epichlorohydrin to acetone of 1:8 , 100 % atom economy. Sr.No.

HBCUs and Chemical Engineering: Analysis of Baccalaureate Programs

Science.gov (United States)

Reeves, Sheena; Thompson, Audie

2018-01-01

Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) provide significant STEM degrees to African Americans. Initiatives toward increasing diversity in STEM fields have been implemented by government and industry leaders. HBCUs annually award over 20% of all African American baccalaureate chemical engineering degrees. This speaks volume to the…

The Intersection of Gender and Race: Exploring Chemical Engineering Students' Attitudes

Science.gov (United States)

Goodwin, Allison; Verdín, Dina; Kirn, Adam; Satterfield, Derrick

2018-01-01

We surveyed 342 first-year engineering students at four U.S. institutions interested in a chemical engineering career about their feelings of belonging in engineering, motivation, and STEM identities. We compared these students by both gender and race/ethnicity on these attitudinal factors. We found several significant differences in…

Shape Memory Polymers: A Joint Chemical and Materials Engineering Hands-On Experience

Science.gov (United States)

Seif, Mujan; Beck, Matthew

2018-01-01

Hands-on experiences are excellent tools for increasing retention of first year engineering students. They also encourage interdisciplinary collaboration, a critical skill for modern engineers. In this paper, we describe and evaluate a joint Chemical and Materials Engineering hands-on lab that explores cross-linking and glass transition in…

Engineering cyanobacteria for fuels and chemicals production.

Science.gov (United States)

Zhou, Jie; Li, Yin

2010-03-01

The world's energy and global warming crises call for sustainable, renewable, carbon-neutral alternatives to replace fossil fuel resources. Currently, most biofuels are produced from agricultural crops and residues, which lead to concerns about food security and land shortage. Compared to the current biofuel production system, cyanobacteria, as autotrophic prokaryotes, do not require arable land and can grow to high densities by efficiently using solar energy, CO(2), water, and inorganic nutrients. Moreover, powerful genetic techniques of cyanobacteria have been developed. For these reasons, cyanobacteria, which carry out oxygenic photosynthesis, are attractive hosts for production of fuels and chemicals. Recently, several chemicals including ethanol, isobutanol and isoprene have been produced by engineered cyanobacteria directly using solar energy, CO(2), and water. Cyanobacterium is therefore a potential novel cell factory for fuels and chemicals production to address global energy security and climate change issues.

Engineering modular polyketide synthases for production of biofuels and industrial chemicals.

Science.gov (United States)

Cai, Wenlong; Zhang, Wenjun

2018-04-01

Polyketide synthases (PKSs) are one of the most profound biosynthetic factories for producing polyketides with diverse structures and biological activities. These enzymes have been historically studied and engineered to make un-natural polyketides for drug discovery, and have also recently been explored for synthesizing biofuels and industrial chemicals due to their versatility and customizability. Here, we review recent advances in the mechanistic understanding and engineering of modular PKSs for producing polyketide-derived chemicals, and provide perspectives on this relatively new application of PKSs. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Chemical Reaction Engineering Applications in Non-traditional Technologies. A Textbook Supplement.

Science.gov (United States)

Savage, Phillip E.; Blaine, Steven

1991-01-01

A set of educational materials that have been developed which deal with chemical engineering applications in emerging technologies is described. The organization and the content of the supplemental textbook materials and how they can be integrated into an undergraduate reaction engineering course are discussed. (KR)

Who.t Chemico.1 Engineering ?

African Journals Online (AJOL)

pian chemical engineer in the major established chemical process industries: sugar and cement mills ... of the chemical en- gineer, may be applied independently or simultane- ... A different approach to the understanding o' the meaning of ...

Use of Research-Based Instructional Strategies in Core Chemical Engineering Courses

Science.gov (United States)

Prince, Michael; Borrego, Maura; Henderson, Charles; Cutler, Stephanie; Froyd, Jeff

2013-01-01

Traditional lecturing remains the most prevalent mode of instruction despite overwhelming research showing the increased effectiveness of many alternate instructional strategies. This study examines chemical engineering instructors' awareness and use of 12 such instructional strategies. The study also examines how chemical engineering…

Metabolic engineering is key to a sustainable chemical industry.

Science.gov (United States)

Murphy, Annabel C

2011-08-01

The depletion of fossil fuel stocks will prohibit their use as the main feedstock of future industrial processes. Biocatalysis is being increasingly used to reduce fossil fuel reliance and to improve the sustainability, efficiency and cost of chemical production. Even with their current small market share, biocatalyzed processes already generate approximately US$50 billion and it has been estimated that they could be used to produce up to 20% of fine chemicals by 2020. Until the advent of molecular biological technologies, the compounds that were readily accessible from renewable biomass were restricted to naturally-occurring metabolites. However, metabolic engineering has considerably broadened the range of compounds now accessible, providing access to compounds that cannot be otherwise reliably sourced, as well as replacing established chemical processes. This review presents the case for continued efforts to promote the adoption of biocatalyzed processes, highlighting successful examples of industrial chemical production from biomass and/or via biocatalyzed processes. A selection of emerging technologies that may further extend the potential and sustainability of biocatalysis are also presented. As the field matures, metabolic engineering will be increasingly crucial in maintaining our quality of life into a future where our current resources and feedstocks cannot be relied upon.

Merged ontology for engineering design: Contrasting empirical and theoretical approaches to develop engineering ontologies

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Ahmed, Saeema; Storga, M

2009-01-01

to developing the ontology engineering design integrated taxonomies (EDIT) with a theoretical approach in which concepts and relations are elicited from engineering design theories ontology (DO) The limitations and advantages of each approach are discussed. The research methodology adopted is to map......This paper presents a comparison of two previous and separate efforts to develop an ontology in the engineering design domain, together with an ontology proposal from which ontologies for a specific application may be derived. The research contrasts an empirical, user-centered approach...

Learning by Brewing: Beer Production Experiments in the Chemical Engineering Laboratory

Science.gov (United States)

Cerretani, Colin; Kelkile, Esayas; Landry, Alexandra

2017-01-01

We discuss the successful creation and implementation of a biotechnology track within the chemical engineering unit operations course. The track focuses on engineering principles relevant to brewing. Following laboratory modules investigating heat transfer processes and yeast fermentation kinetics, student groups design and implement a project to…

The approach to engineering tasks composition on knowledge portals

Science.gov (United States)

Novogrudska, Rina; Globa, Larysa; Schill, Alexsander; Romaniuk, Ryszard; Wójcik, Waldemar; Karnakova, Gaini; Kalizhanova, Aliya

2017-08-01

The paper presents an approach to engineering tasks composition on engineering knowledge portals. The specific features of engineering tasks are highlighted, their analysis makes the basis for partial engineering tasks integration. The formal algebraic system for engineering tasks composition is proposed, allowing to set the context-independent formal structures for engineering tasks elements' description. The method of engineering tasks composition is developed that allows to integrate partial calculation tasks into general calculation tasks on engineering portals, performed on user request demand. The real world scenario «Calculation of the strength for the power components of magnetic systems» is represented, approving the applicability and efficiency of proposed approach.

Chemical composition and photochemical reactivity of exhaust from aircraft turbine engines

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

T. F. Lyon

Full Text Available Assessment of the environmental impact of aircraft emissions is required by planners and policy makers. Seveal areas of concern are: 1. exposure of airport workers and urban residents to toxic chemicals emitted when the engines operate at low power (idle and taxi on the ground; 2. contributions to urban photochemical air pollution of aircraft volatile organic and nitrogen oxides emissions from operations around airports; and 3. emissions of nitrogen oxides and particles during high-altitude operation. The environmental impact of chemicals emitted from jet aircraft turbine engines has not been firmly established due to lack of data regarding emission rates and identities of the compounds emitted. This paper describes an experimental study of two different aircraft turbine engines designed to determine detailed organic emissions, as well as emissions of inorganic gases. Emissions were measured at several engine power settings. Measurements were made of detailed organic composition from C₁ through C₁₇, CO, CO₂, NO, NO_x, and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons. Measurements were made using a multi-port sampling pro be positioned directly behind the engine in the exhaust exit plane. The emission measurements have been used to determine the organic distribution by carbon number and the distribution by compound class at each engine power level. The sum of the organic species was compared with an independent measurement of total organic carbon to assess the carbon mass balance. A portion of the exhaust was captured and irradiated in outdoor smog chambers to assess the photochemical reactivity of the emissions with respect to ozone formation. The reactivity of emissions from the two engines was apportioned by chemical compound class.

Magnetic Resonance Imaging and Velocity Mapping in Chemical Engineering Applications.

Science.gov (United States)

Gladden, Lynn F; Sederman, Andrew J

2017-06-07

This review aims to illustrate the diversity of measurements that can be made using magnetic resonance techniques, which have the potential to provide insights into chemical engineering systems that cannot readily be achieved using any other method. Perhaps the most notable advantage in using magnetic resonance methods is that both chemistry and transport can be followed in three dimensions, in optically opaque systems, and without the need for tracers to be introduced into the system. Here we focus on hydrodynamics and, in particular, applications to rheology, pipe flow, and fixed-bed and gas-solid fluidized bed reactors. With increasing development of industrially relevant sample environments and undersampling data acquisition strategies that can reduce acquisition times to chemical engineering research.

Engineering design: A cognitive process approach

Science.gov (United States)

Strimel, Greg Joseph

research objectives of this study. Two independent coders then coded the video/audio recordings and the additional design data using Halfin's (1973) 17 mental processes for technological problem-solving. The results of this study indicated that the participants employed a wide array of mental processes when solving engineering design challenges. However, the findings provide a general analysis of the number of times participants employed each mental process, as well as the amount of time consumed employing the various mental processes through the different stages of the engineering design process. The results indicated many similarities between the students solving the problem, which may highlight voids in current technology and engineering education curricula. Additionally, the findings showed differences between the processes employed by participants that created the most successful solutions and the participants who developed the least effective solutions. Upon comparing and contrasting these processes, recommendations for instructional strategies to enhance a student's capability for solving engineering design problems were developed. The results also indicated that students, when left without teacher intervention, use a simplified and more natural process to solve design challenges than the 12-step engineering design process reported in much of the literature. Lastly, these data indicated that students followed two different approaches to solving the design problem. Some students employed a sequential and logical approach, while others employed a nebulous, solution centered trial-and-error approach to solving the problem. In this study the participants who were more sequential had better performing solutions. Examining these two approaches and the student cognition data enabled the researcher to generate a conceptual engineering design model for the improved teaching and development of engineering design problem solving.

ENGINEERED BARRIER SYSTEM: PHYSICAL AND CHEMICAL ENVIRONMENT

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

R. Jarek

2005-01-01

The purpose of this model report is to describe the evolution of the physical and chemical environmental conditions within the waste emplacement drifts of the repository, including the drip shield and waste package surfaces. The resulting seepage evaporation and gas abstraction models are used in the total system performance assessment for the license application (TSPA-LA) to assess the performance of the engineered barrier system and the waste form. This report develops and documents a set of abstraction-level models that describe the engineered barrier system physical and chemical environment. Where possible, these models use information directly from other reports as input, which promotes integration among process models used for TSPA-LA. Specific tasks and activities of modeling the physical and chemical environment are included in ''Technical Work Plan for: Near-Field Environment and Transport In-Drift Geochemistry Model Report Integration'' (BSC 2005 [DIRS 173782], Section 1.2.2). As described in the technical work plan, the development of this report is coordinated with the development of other engineered barrier system reports. To be consistent with other project documents that address features, events, and processes (FEPs), Table 6.14.1 of the current report includes updates to FEP numbers and FEP subjects for two FEPs identified in the technical work plan (TWP) governing this report (BSC 2005 [DIRS 173782]). FEP 2.1.09.06.0A (Reduction-oxidation potential in EBS), as listed in Table 2 of the TWP (BSC 2005 [DIRS 173782]), has been updated in the current report to FEP 2.1.09.06.0B (Reduction-oxidation potential in Drifts; see Table 6.14-1). FEP 2.1.09.07.0A (Reaction kinetics in EBS), as listed in Table 2 of the TWP (BSC 2005 [DIRS 173782]), has been updated in the current report to FEP 2.1.09.07.0B (Reaction kinetics in Drifts; see Table 6.14-1). These deviations from the TWP are justified because they improve integration with FEPs documents. The updates

Synthetic biology approaches to engineering the nitrogen symbiosis in cereals.

Science.gov (United States)

Rogers, Christian; Oldroyd, Giles E D

2014-05-01

Nitrogen is abundant in the earth's atmosphere but, unlike carbon, cannot be directly assimilated by plants. The limitation this places on plant productivity has been circumvented in contemporary agriculture through the production and application of chemical fertilizers. The chemical reduction of nitrogen for this purpose consumes large amounts of energy and the reactive nitrogen released into the environment as a result of fertilizer application leads to greenhouse gas emissions, as well as widespread eutrophication of aquatic ecosystems. The environmental impacts are intensified by injudicious use of fertilizers in many parts of the world. Simultaneously, limitations in the production and supply of chemical fertilizers in other regions are leading to low agricultural productivity and malnutrition. Nitrogen can be directly fixed from the atmosphere by some bacteria and Archaea, which possess the enzyme nitrogenase. Some plant species, most notably legumes, have evolved close symbiotic associations with nitrogen-fixing bacteria. Engineering cereal crops with the capability to fix their own nitrogen could one day address the problems created by the over- and under-use of nitrogen fertilizers in agriculture. This could be achieved either by expression of a functional nitrogenase enzyme in the cells of the cereal crop or through transferring the capability to form a symbiotic association with nitrogen-fixing bacteria. While potentially transformative, these biotechnological approaches are challenging; however, with recent advances in synthetic biology they are viable long-term goals. This review discusses the possibility of these biotechnological solutions to the nitrogen problem, focusing on engineering the nitrogen symbiosis in cereals.

Advanced computational approaches to biomedical engineering

CERN Document Server

Saha, Punam K; Basu, Subhadip

2014-01-01

There has been rapid growth in biomedical engineering in recent decades, given advancements in medical imaging and physiological modelling and sensing systems, coupled with immense growth in computational and network technology, analytic approaches, visualization and virtual-reality, man-machine interaction and automation. Biomedical engineering involves applying engineering principles to the medical and biological sciences and it comprises several topics including biomedicine, medical imaging, physiological modelling and sensing, instrumentation, real-time systems, automation and control, sig

Amazing variational approach to chemical reactions

OpenAIRE

Fernández, Francisco M.

2009-01-01

In this letter we analyse an amazing variational approach to chemical reactions. Our results clearly show that the variational expressions are unsuitable for the analysis of empirical data obtained from chemical reactions.

Materials of 44. Scientific Assembly of Polish Chemical Society and Association of Engineers and Technicians of Chemical Industry

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

2001-01-01

Scientific assemblies of Polish Chemical Society and Association of Engineers and Technicians of Chemical Industry are the most important chemical meeting organised annually in Poland. Basic as well as application studies in all chemical branches have been extensively presented. The next subjects was proposed as scientific sessions and symposia topics: solid state chemistry; didactics of chemistry; electrochemistry; biologically active compounds; geochemistry; organic chemistry; physical chemistry; environment quality and protection; coordination chemistry; chemical technology; polymers; explosive materials; analytical chemistry; theoretical chemistry

Comparing Two Approaches for Engineering Education Development

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Edström, Kristina; Kolmos, Anette

2012-01-01

During the last decade there have been two dominating models for reforming engineering education: Problem/Project Based Learning (PBL) and the CDIO Initiative. The aim of this paper is to compare the PBL and CDIO approaches to engineering education reform, to identify and explain similarities...... and differences. CDIO and PBL will each be defined and compared in terms of the original need analysis, underlying educational philosophy and the essentials of the respective approaches to engineering education. In these respects we see many similarities. Circumstances that explain differences in history...... approaches have much in common and can be combined, and especially that the practitioners have much to learn from each other’s experiences through a dialogue between the communities. This structured comparison will potentially indicate specifically what an institution experienced in one of the communities...

An algebraic approach to modeling in software engineering

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Loegel, C.J.; Ravishankar, C.V.

1993-09-01

Our work couples the formalism of universal algebras with the engineering techniques of mathematical modeling to develop a new approach to the software engineering process. Our purpose in using this combination is twofold. First, abstract data types and their specification using universal algebras can be considered a common point between the practical requirements of software engineering and the formal specification of software systems. Second, mathematical modeling principles provide us with a means for effectively analyzing real-world systems. We first use modeling techniques to analyze a system and then represent the analysis using universal algebras. The rest of the software engineering process exploits properties of universal algebras that preserve the structure of our original model. This paper describes our software engineering process and our experience using it on both research and commercial systems. We need a new approach because current software engineering practices often deliver software that is difficult to develop and maintain. Formal software engineering approaches use universal algebras to describe ''computer science'' objects like abstract data types, but in practice software errors are often caused because ''real-world'' objects are improperly modeled. There is a large semantic gap between the customer's objects and abstract data types. In contrast, mathematical modeling uses engineering techniques to construct valid models for real-world systems, but these models are often implemented in an ad hoc manner. A combination of the best features of both approaches would enable software engineering to formally specify and develop software systems that better model real systems. Software engineering, like mathematical modeling, should concern itself first and foremost with understanding a real system and its behavior under given circumstances, and then with expressing this knowledge in an executable form

A Dynamic Intelligent Decision Approach to Dependency Modeling of Project Tasks in Complex Engineering System Optimization

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Tinggui Chen

2013-01-01

Full Text Available Complex engineering system optimization usually involves multiple projects or tasks. On the one hand, dependency modeling among projects or tasks highlights structures in systems and their environments which can help to understand the implications of connectivity on different aspects of system performance and also assist in designing, optimizing, and maintaining complex systems. On the other hand, multiple projects or tasks are either happening at the same time or scheduled into a sequence in order to use common resources. In this paper, we propose a dynamic intelligent decision approach to dependency modeling of project tasks in complex engineering system optimization. The approach takes this decision process as a two-stage decision-making problem. In the first stage, a task clustering approach based on modularization is proposed so as to find out a suitable decomposition scheme for a large-scale project. In the second stage, according to the decomposition result, a discrete artificial bee colony (ABC algorithm inspired by the intelligent foraging behavior of honeybees is developed for the resource constrained multiproject scheduling problem. Finally, a certain case from an engineering design of a chemical processing system is utilized to help to understand the proposed approach.

Complementary use of life cycle assessment and risk assessment for engineered nanomaterials: Lessons learned from chemicals?

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Grieger, Khara D.; Laurent, Alexis; Miseljic, Mirko

2013-01-01

Successful strategies to handle the potential health and environmental risks of engineered nanomaterials (ENM) often rely upon the well-established frameworks of life cycle assessment (LCA) and risk assessment (RA). However, current research and specific guidance on how to actually apply these two...... scientific research efforts have taken into account some key lessons learned from past experiences with chemicals at the same time that many key challenges remain to applying these frameworks to ENM. In that setting, two main proposed approaches to use LCA and RA together for ENM are identified: i) LC......-based RA, similar to traditional RA applied in a life cycle perspective, and ii) RA-complemented LCA, similar to conventional LCA supplemented by RA in specific life cycle steps. This study finds that these two approaches for using LCA and RA together for ENM are similar to those made for chemicals...

Materials of 48. Scientific Assembly of Polish Chemical Society and Association of Engineers and Technicians of Chemical

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

2005-01-01

Scientific assemblies of Polish Chemical Society are the most important chemical meeting organised annually in Poland. Basic as well as application studies in all chemical branches have been extensively presented. The next subjects was proposed as scientific sessions and symposia topics: chemistry of metalorganic and supramolecular compounds; organic and bioorganic chemistry; coordination and bioinorganic chemistry; chemistry of polymers and biopolymers; physical and theoretical chemistry; catalysis; structural chemistry; analytical chemistry and environmental protection chemistry of materials and nanomaterials; technology and chemical engineering; didactics of chemistry; young scientist forum; chemistry for economy

Chemical and engineering approaches to enable organic field-effect transistors for electronic skin applications.

Science.gov (United States)

Sokolov, Anatoliy N; Tee, Benjamin C-K; Bettinger, Christopher J; Tok, Jeffrey B-H; Bao, Zhenan

2012-03-20

Skin is the body's largest organ and is responsible for the transduction of a vast amount of information. This conformable material simultaneously collects signals from external stimuli that translate into information such as pressure, pain, and temperature. The development of an electronic material, inspired by the complexity of this organ is a tremendous, unrealized engineering challenge. However, the advent of carbon-based electronics may offer a potential solution to this long-standing problem. In this Account, we describe the use of an organic field-effect transistor (OFET) architecture to transduce mechanical and chemical stimuli into electrical signals. In developing this mimic of human skin, we thought of the sensory elements of the OFET as analogous to the various layers and constituents of skin. In this fashion, each layer of the OFET can be optimized to carry out a specific recognition function. The separation of multimodal sensing among the components of the OFET may be considered a "divide and conquer" approach, where the electronic skin (e-skin) can take advantage of the optimized chemistry and materials properties of each layer. This design of a novel microstructured gate dielectric has led to unprecedented sensitivity for tactile pressure events. Typically, pressure-sensitive components within electronic configurations have suffered from a lack of sensitivity or long mechanical relaxation times often associated with elastomeric materials. Within our method, these components are directly compatible with OFETs and have achieved the highest reported sensitivity to date. Moreover, the tactile sensors operate on a time scale comparable with human skin, making them ideal candidates for integration as synthetic skin devices. The methodology is compatible with large-scale fabrication and employs simple, commercially available elastomers. The design of materials within the semiconductor layer has led to the incorporation of selectivity and sensitivity within

Abstracts of the 54. Canadian Chemical Engineering Conference : Energy for the Future

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

2004-01-01

The key energy challenges facing the chemical process industries were addressed at this international conference. Chemical engineering was shown to play a critical role in offering technical solutions to the challenges of climate change and pollution abatement on a global scale. The sessions addressed a variety of issues dealing with heavy oil processing and utilization, natural gas processing, reservoir engineering and biotechnology process systems. The presentations also addressed issues dealing with applied thermodynamics, new technologies, polymer engineering and other fundamental processes, including some used by the pulp and paper industry. The conference featured more than 500 presentations from around the world, including Canada, the United States, Asia and Europe. A total of 84 papers have been indexed separately for inclusion in this database

An Event-driven, Value-based, Pull Systems Engineering Scheduling Approach

Science.gov (United States)

2012-03-01

combining a services approach to systems engineering with a kanban -based scheduling system. It provides the basis for validating the approach with...agent-based simulations. Keywords-systems engineering; systems engineering process; lean; kanban ; process simulation I. INTRODUCTION AND BACKGROUND...approaches [8], [9], we are investigating the use of flow-based pull scheduling techniques ( kanban systems) in a rapid response development

Homogenization approach in engineering

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Babuska, I.

1975-10-01

Homogenization is an approach which studies the macrobehavior of a medium by its microproperties. Problems with a microstructure play an essential role in such fields as mechanics, chemistry, physics, and reactor engineering. Attention is concentrated on a simple specific model problem to illustrate results and problems typical of the homogenization approach. Only the diffusion problem is treated here, but some statements are made about the elasticity of composite materials. The differential equation is solved for linear cases with and without boundaries and for the nonlinear case. 3 figures, 1 table

Co-Optimization of Fuels & Engines: Fuel Blendstocks with the Potential to Optimize Future Gasoline Engine Performance; Identification of Five Chemical Families for Detailed Evaluation

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Farrell, John T [National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), Golden, CO (United States); Holladay, John [Pacific Northwest National Laboratory; Wagner, Robert [Oak Ridge National Laboratory

2018-04-18

The U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE's) Co-Optimization of Fuels & Engines (Co-Optima) initiative is conducting the early-stage research needed to accelerate the market introduction of advanced fuel and engine technologies. The research includes both spark-ignition (SI) and compression-ignition (CI) combustion approaches, targeting applications that impact the entire on-road fleet (light-, medium-, and heavy-duty vehicles). The initiative's major goals include significant improvements in vehicle fuel economy, lower-cost pathways to reduce emissions, and leveraging diverse U.S. fuel resources. A key objective of Co-Optima's research is to identify new blendstocks that enhance current petroleum blending components, increase blendstock diversity, and provide refiners with increased flexibility to blend fuels with the key properties required to optimize advanced internal combustion engines. This report identifies eight representative blendstocks from five chemical families that have demonstrated the potential to increase boosted SI engine efficiency, meet key fuel quality requirements, and be viable for production at commercial scale by 2025-2030.

Using vegetable oils and animal fats in Diesel Engines: chemical analyses and engine texts

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Marmino, I.; Verhelst, S.; Sierens, R.

2008-01-01

In this work, some vegetable oils (rapeseed oil, palm oil) and animal fat were tested in a Diesel engine at a range of engine spreads and torque settings, after preheating at 70 0 C. Engine performance, fuel consumption and NOx, unburnt hydrocarbons and soot emissions have been recorded. The results have been compared to those obtained with diesel fuel in the same test conditions. The oils and fats were also analyzed for their physical and chemical properties (viscosity, composition, unsaturation, heating value). NOx emissions were found to be lower for the oils than for the diesel fuel. This, combined with higher HC emissions, can probably be explained through less effective atomization due to the higher viscosity of the oils and fat. On the other hand, soot emissions were found to decrease. [it

ENGINEERED BARRIER SYSTEM: PHYSICAL AND CHEMICAL ENVIRONMENT

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

R. Jarek

2005-08-29

The purpose of this model report is to describe the evolution of the physical and chemical environmental conditions within the waste emplacement drifts of the repository, including the drip shield and waste package surfaces. The resulting seepage evaporation and gas abstraction models are used in the total system performance assessment for the license application (TSPA-LA) to assess the performance of the engineered barrier system and the waste form. This report develops and documents a set of abstraction-level models that describe the engineered barrier system physical and chemical environment. Where possible, these models use information directly from other reports as input, which promotes integration among process models used for TSPA-LA. Specific tasks and activities of modeling the physical and chemical environment are included in ''Technical Work Plan for: Near-Field Environment and Transport In-Drift Geochemistry Model Report Integration'' (BSC 2005 [DIRS 173782], Section 1.2.2). As described in the technical work plan, the development of this report is coordinated with the development of other engineered barrier system reports. To be consistent with other project documents that address features, events, and processes (FEPs), Table 6.14.1 of the current report includes updates to FEP numbers and FEP subjects for two FEPs identified in the technical work plan (TWP) governing this report (BSC 2005 [DIRS 173782]). FEP 2.1.09.06.0A (Reduction-oxidation potential in EBS), as listed in Table 2 of the TWP (BSC 2005 [DIRS 173782]), has been updated in the current report to FEP 2.1.09.06.0B (Reduction-oxidation potential in Drifts; see Table 6.14-1). FEP 2.1.09.07.0A (Reaction kinetics in EBS), as listed in Table 2 of the TWP (BSC 2005 [DIRS 173782]), has been updated in the current report to FEP 2.1.09.07.0B (Reaction kinetics in Drifts; see Table 6.14-1). These deviations from the TWP are justified because they improve integration with FEPs

Interdisciplinary Approach in Engineering Education

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Anda Zeidmane

2011-04-01

Full Text Available The analysis of the scientific literature available on the types of general competences and their classification caused the authors to conclude that it is necessary to implement interdisciplinary approach in engineering education to develop competences necessary for engineers to make them competitive in the labour market. The attention should be paid to a professional foreign language, computer literacy and educational psychology recommendations. To improve professional foreign language skills, CLIL (Content and Language Integrated Learning method should be integrated in the study process of engineering education. In order to develop information literacy competence, it is important to create a single e-study environment. The academic staff, developing study subjects for engineering programmes, should focus on the study content and study methods. As regards the content, the compromise should be sought between fundamental acquisition of the knowledge of the subject matter, the know-how of the application of this knowledge as well as the use of brand new software in the calculations. The paper presents the examples of the application of the interdisciplinary approach in the universities, where the authors of the paper are affiliated: the LUA (Latvia University of Agriculture and the RTU (Riga Technical University, respectively.

Engineering synergy in biotechnology

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Nielsen, Jens; Fussenegger, Martin; Keasling, Jay

2014-01-01

In this article, the author focuses on approaches in metabolic engineering and synthetic biology for the creation of efficient cell factories, which can be bused to convert biomass and other feedstocks for the generation of chemicals. Topics discussed include development of restriction enzymes......, engineering plasmids and recyclable markers, production of 1,3-propanediol using a metabolically engineered Escherichia coli and production of isobutanol by using metabolically engineered yeast....

Metabolic Engineering of Oleaginous Yeasts for Production of Fuels and Chemicals

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Shuobo Shi

2017-11-01

Full Text Available Oleaginous yeasts have been increasingly explored for production of chemicals and fuels via metabolic engineering. Particularly, there is a growing interest in using oleaginous yeasts for the synthesis of lipid-related products due to their high lipogenesis capability, robustness, and ability to utilize a variety of substrates. Most of the metabolic engineering studies in oleaginous yeasts focused on Yarrowia that already has plenty of genetic engineering tools. However, recent advances in systems biology and synthetic biology have provided new strategies and tools to engineer those oleaginous yeasts that have naturally high lipid accumulation but lack genetic tools, such as Rhodosporidium, Trichosporon, and Lipomyces. This review highlights recent accomplishments in metabolic engineering of oleaginous yeasts and recent advances in the development of genetic engineering tools in oleaginous yeasts within the last 3 years.

Engineering microbial chemical factories to produce renewable "biomonomers".

Science.gov (United States)

Adkins, Jake; Pugh, Shawn; McKenna, Rebekah; Nielsen, David R

2012-01-01

By applying metabolic engineering tools and strategies to engineer synthetic enzyme pathways, the number and diversity of commodity and specialty chemicals that can be derived directly from renewable feedstocks is rapidly and continually expanding. This of course includes a number of monomer building-block chemicals that can be used to produce replacements to many conventional plastic materials. This review aims to highlight numerous recent and important advancements in the microbial production of these so-called "biomonomers." Relative to naturally-occurring renewable bioplastics, biomonomers offer several important advantages, including improved control over the final polymer structure and purity, the ability to synthesize non-natural copolymers, and allowing products to be excreted from cells which ultimately streamlines downstream recovery and purification. To highlight these features, a handful of biomonomers have been selected as illustrative examples of recent works, including polyamide monomers, styrenic vinyls, hydroxyacids, and diols. Where appropriate, examples of their industrial penetration to date and end-product uses are also highlighted. Novel biomonomers such as these are ultimately paving the way toward new classes of renewable bioplastics that possess a broader diversity of properties than ever before possible.

Artificial organ engineering

CERN Document Server

Annesini, Maria Cristina; Piemonte, Vincenzo; Turchetti, Luca

2017-01-01

Artificial organs may be considered as small-scale process plants, in which heat, mass and momentum transfer operations and, possibly, chemical transformations are carried out. This book proposes a novel analysis of artificial organs based on the typical bottom-up approach used in process engineering. Starting from a description of the fundamental physico-chemical phenomena involved in the process, the whole system is rebuilt as an interconnected ensemble of elemental unit operations. Each artificial organ is presented with a short introduction provided by expert clinicians. Devices commonly used in clinical practice are reviewed and their performance is assessed and compared by using a mathematical model based approach. Whilst mathematical modelling is a fundamental tool for quantitative descriptions of clinical devices, models are kept simple to remain focused on the essential features of each process. Postgraduate students and researchers in the field of chemical and biomedical engineering will find that t...

Engineering microbial electrocatalysis for chemical and fuel production.

Science.gov (United States)

Rosenbaum, Miriam A; Henrich, Alexander W

2014-10-01

In many biotechnological areas, metabolic engineering and synthetic biology have become core technologies for biocatalyst development. Microbial electrocatalysis for biochemical and fuel production is still in its infancy and reactions rates and the product spectrum are currently very low. Therefore, molecular engineering strategies will be crucial for the advancement and realization of many new bioproduction routes using electroactive microorganisms. The complex and unresolved biochemistry and physiology of extracellular electron transfer and the lack of molecular tools for these new non-model hosts for genetic engineering constitute the major challenges for this effort. This review is providing an insight into the current status, challenges and promising approaches of pathway engineering for microbial electrocatalysis. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Modeling of coupled differential equations for cellular chemical signaling pathways: Implications for assay protocols utilized in cellular engineering.

Science.gov (United States)

O'Clock, George D

2016-08-01

Cellular engineering involves modification and control of cell properties, and requires an understanding of fundamentals and mechanisms of action for cellular derived product development. One of the keys to success in cellular engineering involves the quality and validity of results obtained from cell chemical signaling pathway assays. The accuracy of the assay data cannot be verified or assured if the effect of positive feedback, nonlinearities, and interrelationships between cell chemical signaling pathway elements are not understood, modeled, and simulated. Nonlinearities and positive feedback in the cell chemical signaling pathway can produce significant aberrations in assay data collection. Simulating the pathway can reveal potential instability problems that will affect assay results. A simulation, using an electrical analog for the coupled differential equations representing each segment of the pathway, provides an excellent tool for assay validation purposes. With this approach, voltages represent pathway enzyme concentrations and operational amplifier feedback resistance and input resistance values determine pathway gain and rate constants. The understanding provided by pathway modeling and simulation is strategically important in order to establish experimental controls for assay protocol structure, time frames specified between assays, and assay concentration variation limits; to ensure accuracy and reproducibility of results.

Hydraulic fracturing chemicals and fluids technology

CERN Document Server

Fink, Johannes

2013-01-01

When classifying fracturing fluids and their additives, it is important that production, operation, and completion engineers understand which chemical should be utilized in different well environments. A user's guide to the many chemicals and chemical additives used in hydraulic fracturing operations, Hydraulic Fracturing Chemicals and Fluids Technology provides an easy-to-use manual to create fluid formulations that will meet project-specific needs while protecting the environment and the life of the well. Fink creates a concise and comprehensive reference that enables the engineer to logically select and use the appropriate chemicals on any hydraulic fracturing job. The first book devoted entirely to hydraulic fracturing chemicals, Fink eliminates the guesswork so the engineer can select the best chemicals needed on the job while providing the best protection for the well, workers and environment. Pinpoints the specific compounds used in any given fracturing operation Provides a systematic approach to class...

Contemporary engineering economics

CERN Document Server

Park, Chan S

2011-01-01

Contemporary Engineering Economics, 5/e, is intended for undergraduate engineering students taking introductory engineering economics while appealing to the full range of engineering disciplines for which this course is often required: industrial, civil, mechanical, electrical, computer, aerospace, chemical, and manufacturing engineering, as well as engineering technology. This edition has been thoroughly revised and updated while continuing to adopt a contemporary approach to the subject, and teaching, of engineering economics. This text aims not only to build a sound and comprehensive coverage of engineering economics, but also to address key educational challenges, such as student difficulty in developing the analytical skills required to make informed financial decisions.

Using hybrid expert system approaches for engineering applications

Science.gov (United States)

Allen, R. H.; Boarnet, M. G.; Culbert, C. J.; Savely, R. T.

1987-01-01

In this paper, the use of hybrid expert system shells and hybrid (i.e., algorithmic and heuristic) approaches for solving engineering problems is reported. Aspects of various engineering problem domains are reviewed for a number of examples with specific applications made to recently developed prototype expert systems. Based on this prototyping experience, critical evaluations of and comparisons between commercially available tools, and some research tools, in the United States and Australia, and their underlying problem-solving paradigms are made. Characteristics of the implementation tool and the engineering domain are compared and practical software engineering issues are discussed with respect to hybrid tools and approaches. Finally, guidelines are offered with the hope that expert system development will be less time consuming, more effective, and more cost-effective than it has been in the past.

Use of the LITEE Lorn Manufacturing Case Study in a Senior Chemical Engineering Unit Operations Laboratory

Science.gov (United States)

Abraham, Nithin Susan; Abulencia, James Patrick

2011-01-01

This study focuses on the effectiveness of incorporating the Laboratory for Innovative Technology and Engineering Education (LITEE) Lorn Manufacturing case into a senior level chemical engineering unit operations course at Manhattan College. The purpose of using the case study is to demonstrate the relevance of ethics to chemical engineering…

A Predictive Approach to Network Reverse-Engineering

Science.gov (United States)

Wiggins, Chris

2005-03-01

A central challenge of systems biology is the ``reverse engineering" of transcriptional networks: inferring which genes exert regulatory control over which other genes. Attempting such inference at the genomic scale has only recently become feasible, via data-intensive biological innovations such as DNA microrrays (``DNA chips") and the sequencing of whole genomes. In this talk we present a predictive approach to network reverse-engineering, in which we integrate DNA chip data and sequence data to build a model of the transcriptional network of the yeast S. cerevisiae capable of predicting the response of genes in unseen experiments. The technique can also be used to extract ``motifs,'' sequence elements which act as binding sites for regulatory proteins. We validate by a number of approaches and present comparison of theoretical prediction vs. experimental data, along with biological interpretations of the resulting model. En route, we will illustrate some basic notions in statistical learning theory (fitting vs. over-fitting; cross- validation; assessing statistical significance), highlighting ways in which physicists can make a unique contribution in data- driven approaches to reverse engineering.

New Approaches in the Engineering and Characterization of Macromolecular Interfaces Across the Length Scales: Applications to Hydrophobic and Stimulus Responsive Polymers

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Song, Jing

2007-01-01

The aim of the present Thesis is to enhance characterization and surface engineering approaches to test and control physico-chemical changes on modified hydrophobic (LDPE and PDMS) and stimulus-responsive (PFS) polymers across different length scales. [Here LDPE denotes low density polyethylene,

Applying chemical engineering concepts to non-thermal plasma reactors

Science.gov (United States)

Pedro AFFONSO, NOBREGA; Alain, GAUNAND; Vandad, ROHANI; François, CAUNEAU; Laurent, FULCHERI

2018-06-01

Process scale-up remains a considerable challenge for environmental applications of non-thermal plasmas. Undersanding the impact of reactor hydrodynamics in the performance of the process is a key step to overcome this challenge. In this work, we apply chemical engineering concepts to analyse the impact that different non-thermal plasma reactor configurations and regimes, such as laminar or plug flow, may have on the reactor performance. We do this in the particular context of the removal of pollutants by non-thermal plasmas, for which a simplified model is available. We generalise this model to different reactor configurations and, under certain hypotheses, we show that a reactor in the laminar regime may have a behaviour significantly different from one in the plug flow regime, often assumed in the non-thermal plasma literature. On the other hand, we show that a packed-bed reactor behaves very similarly to one in the plug flow regime. Beyond those results, the reader will find in this work a quick introduction to chemical reaction engineering concepts.

Understanding performance properties of chemical engines under a trade-off optimization: Low-dissipation versus endoreversible model

Science.gov (United States)

Tang, F. R.; Zhang, Rong; Li, Huichao; Li, C. N.; Liu, Wei; Bai, Long

2018-05-01

The trade-off criterion is used to systemically investigate the performance features of two chemical engine models (the low-dissipation model and the endoreversible model). The optimal efficiencies, the dissipation ratios, and the corresponding ratios of the dissipation rates for two models are analytically determined. Furthermore, the performance properties of two kinds of chemical engines are precisely compared and analyzed, and some interesting physics is revealed. Our investigations show that the certain universal equivalence between two models is within the framework of the linear irreversible thermodynamics, and their differences are rooted in the different physical contexts. Our results can contribute to a precise understanding of the general features of chemical engines.

Effects of chemical equilibrium on turbine engine performance for various fuels and combustor temperatures

Science.gov (United States)

Tran, Donald H.; Snyder, Christopher A.

1992-01-01

A study was performed to quantify the differences in turbine engine performance with and without the chemical dissociation effects for various fuel types over a range of combustor temperatures. Both turbojet and turbofan engines were studied with hydrocarbon fuels and cryogenic, nonhydrocarbon fuels. Results of the study indicate that accuracy of engine performance decreases when nonhydrocarbon fuels are used, especially at high temperatures where chemical dissociation becomes more significant. For instance, the deviation in net thrust for liquid hydrogen fuel can become as high as 20 percent at 4160 R. This study reveals that computer central processing unit (CPU) time increases significantly when dissociation effects are included in the cycle analysis.

A multi-scale, multi-disciplinary approach for assessing the technological, economic and environmental performance of bio-based chemicals.

Science.gov (United States)

Herrgård, Markus; Sukumara, Sumesh; Campodonico, Miguel; Zhuang, Kai

2015-12-01

In recent years, bio-based chemicals have gained interest as a renewable alternative to petrochemicals. However, there is a significant need to assess the technological, biological, economic and environmental feasibility of bio-based chemicals, particularly during the early research phase. Recently, the Multi-scale framework for Sustainable Industrial Chemicals (MuSIC) was introduced to address this issue by integrating modelling approaches at different scales ranging from cellular to ecological scales. This framework can be further extended by incorporating modelling of the petrochemical value chain and the de novo prediction of metabolic pathways connecting existing host metabolism to desirable chemical products. This multi-scale, multi-disciplinary framework for quantitative assessment of bio-based chemicals will play a vital role in supporting engineering, strategy and policy decisions as we progress towards a sustainable chemical industry. © 2015 Authors; published by Portland Press Limited.

Chemical Engineering Division annual technical report, 1980

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Burris, L.; Webster, D.S.; Barney, D.L.; Cafasso, F.A.; Steindler, M.J.

1981-06-01

Highlights of the Chemical Engineering (CEN) Division's activities during 1980 are presented. In this period, CEN conducted research and development in the following areas: (1) rechargeable lithium-aluminum/iron sulfide batteries for electric vehicles and other applications; (2) ambient-temperature batteries - improved lead-acid, nickel/zinc, and nickel/iron - for electric vehicles; (3) energy-efficient industrial electrochemical processes; (4) molten carbonate fuel cells for use by electric utilities; (5) coal technology, mainly fluidized-bed combustion of coal in the presence of SO 2 sorbent of limestone; (6) heat- and seed-recovery technology for open-cycle magnetohydrodynamic systems; (7) solar energy collectors and thermal energy storage; (8) fast breeder reactor chemistry research - chemical support of reactor safety studies, chemistry of irradiated fuels, and sodium technology; (9) fuel cycle technology - management of nuclear wastes, reprocessing of nuclear fuels, and proof-of-breeding studies for the Light Water Breeder Reactor; and (10) magnetic fusion research - systems analysis and engineering experimentation, materials research, and neutron dosimetry and damage analysis. The CEN Division also has a basic energy sciences program, which includes experimental and theoretical research on (1) the catalytic hydrogenation of carbon monoxide and methanol homologation, (2) the thermodynamic properties of a wide variety of inorganic and organic materials, (3) significant mechanisms for the formation of atmospheric sulfate and nitrogen-bearing aerosols, (4) processes occurring at electrodes and in electrolytes, and (5) the physical properties of salt vapors. In addition, the Division operated the Central Analytical Chemistry Laboratory

Materials of 47. Scientific Assembly of Polish Chemical Society and Association of Engineers and Technicians of Chemical Industry. Volume 3

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

2004-01-01

Scientific assemblies of Polish Chemical Society are the most important chemical meeting organised annually in Poland. Basic as well as application studies in all chemical branches have been extensively presented. The next subjects was proposed as scientific sessions and symposia topics: organic chemistry, inorganic chemistry, physical chemistry, analytical chemistry, technology and chemical engineering, polymer chemistry, solid state chemistry, catalysis, biological chemistry, chemistry and technology of coal, environmental protection, didactics of chemistry, history of chemistry, young scientist forum

Opportunities for Merging Chemical and Biological Synthesis

Science.gov (United States)

Wallace, Stephen; Balskus, Emily P.

2014-01-01

Organic chemists and metabolic engineers use largely orthogonal technologies to access small molecules like pharmaceuticals and commodity chemicals. As the use of biological catalysts and engineered organisms for chemical production grows, it is becoming increasingly evident that future efforts for chemical manufacture will benefit from the integration and unified expansion of these two fields. This review will discuss approaches that combine chemical and biological synthesis for small molecule production. We highlight recent advances in combining enzymatic and non-enzymatic catalysis in vitro, discuss the application of design principles from organic chemistry for engineering non-biological reactivity into enzymes, and describe the development of biocompatible chemistry that can be interfaced with microbial metabolism. PMID:24747284

Computer-Aided Multiscale Modelling for Chemical Process Engineering

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Morales Rodriguez, Ricardo; Gani, Rafiqul

2007-01-01

Chemical processes are generally modeled through monoscale approaches, which, while not adequate, satisfy a useful role in product-process design. In this case, use of a multi-dimensional and multi-scale model-based approach has importance in product-process development. A computer-aided framework...

Chemical Engineering of Photoactivity in Heterometallic Titanium-Organic Frameworks by Metal Doping.

Science.gov (United States)

Castells-Gil, Javier; Padial, Natalia M; Almora-Barrios, Neyvis; Albero, Josep; Ruiz-Salvador, A Rabdel; González-Platas, Javier; García, Hermenegildo; Martí-Gastaldo, Carlos

2018-06-06

We report a new family of titanium-organic frameworks that enlarges the limited number of crystalline, porous materials available for this metal. They are chemically robust and can be prepared as single crystals at multi-gram scale from multiple precursors. Their heterometallic structure enables engineering of their photoactivity by metal doping rather than by linker functionalization. Compared to other methodologies based on the post-synthetic metallation of MOFs, our approach is well-fitted for controlling the positioning of dopants at an atomic level to gain more precise control over the band-gap and electronic properties of the porous solid. Changes in the band-gap are also rationalized with computational modelling and experimentally confirmed by photocatalytic H 2 production. © 2018 Wiley-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.

Rurality as an Asset for Inclusive Teaching in Chemical Engineering

Science.gov (United States)

Gomez, Jamie; Svihla, Vanessa

2018-01-01

We developed and tested a pedagogical strategy--asset-based design challenges--to enhance diversity in early chemical engineering coursework. Using qualitative methods, we found first-year students justified high-cost solutions with ethical arguments; teams that included rural expertise argued instead for economically-viable solutions. In the…

Advances in metabolic engineering of yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae for production of chemicals.

Science.gov (United States)

Borodina, Irina; Nielsen, Jens

2014-05-01

Yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae is an important industrial host for production of enzymes, pharmaceutical and nutraceutical ingredients and recently also commodity chemicals and biofuels. Here, we review the advances in modeling and synthetic biology tools and how these tools can speed up the development of yeast cell factories. We also present an overview of metabolic engineering strategies for developing yeast strains for production of polymer monomers: lactic, succinic, and cis,cis-muconic acids. S. cerevisiae has already firmly established itself as a cell factory in industrial biotechnology and the advances in yeast strain engineering will stimulate development of novel yeast-based processes for chemicals production. Copyright © 2014 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.

NNEPEQ: Chemical equilibrium version of the Navy/NASA Engine Program

Science.gov (United States)

Fishbach, Laurence H.; Gordon, Sanford

1988-01-01

The Navy NASA Engine Program, NNEP, currently is in use at a large number of government agencies, commercial companies and universities. This computer code has bee used extensively to calculate the design and off-design (matched) performance of a broad range of turbine engines, ranging from subsonic turboprops to variable cycle engines for supersonic transports. Recently, there has been increased interest in applications for which NNEP was not capable of simulating, namely, high Mach applications, alternate fuels including cryogenics, and cycles such as the gas generator air-turbo-rocker (ATR). In addition, there is interest in cycles employing ejectors such as for military fighters. New engine component models had to be created for incorporation into NNEP, and it was found necessary to include chemical dissociation effects of high temperature gases. The incorporation of these extended capabilities into NNEP is discussed and some of the effects of these changes are illustrated.

NNEPEQ - Chemical equilibrium version of the Navy/NASA Engine Program

Science.gov (United States)

Fishbach, L. H.; Gordon, S.

1989-01-01

The Navy NASA Engine Program, NNEP, currently is in use at a large number of government agencies, commercial companies and universities. This computer code has been used extensively to calculate the design and off-design (matched) performance of a broad range of turbine engines, ranging from subsonic turboprops to variable cycle engines for supersonic transports. Recently, there has been increased interest in applications for which NNEP was not capable of simulating, namely, high Mach applications, alternate fuels including cryogenics, and cycles such as the gas generator air-turbo-rocker (ATR). In addition, there is interest in cycles employing ejectors such as for military fighters. New engine component models had to be created for incorporation into NNEP, and it was found necessary to include chemical dissociation effects of high temperature gases. The incorporation of these extended capabilities into NNEP is discussed and some of the effects of these changes are illustrated.

Abstracts Book of Jubilee Scientific Assembly of Polish Chemical Society and Association of Engineers and Technicians of Chemical Industry

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

2000-01-01

Scientific Assemblies of Polish Chemical Society and Association of Engineers and Technicians of Chemical Industry are most important chemical discussion forum organised annually in Poland. Basic as well as application studies in all chemical branches have been extensively presented. The next subjects was proposed as sections and symposia topics: organic chemistry, physical chemistry (chemical kinetics, catalysis, thermodynamics), membranes and membrane processes, biological chemistry, biotechnology, metalorganic compounds and complexes, polymer chemistry, crystallochemical study, spectroscopy in nowadays chemistry, supramolecular chemistry, chemistry and technology of coal, high-energetic materials, environment protection, didactics in chemistry, radiation chemistry, photochemistry, electrochemistry, chemistry and technology of carbohydrates, theoretical and computer chemistry, young scientists forum, history of chemistry

Chemical entity recognition in patents by combining dictionary-based and statistical approaches

Science.gov (United States)

Akhondi, Saber A.; Pons, Ewoud; Afzal, Zubair; van Haagen, Herman; Becker, Benedikt F.H.; Hettne, Kristina M.; van Mulligen, Erik M.; Kors, Jan A.

2016-01-01

We describe the development of a chemical entity recognition system and its application in the CHEMDNER-patent track of BioCreative 2015. This community challenge includes a Chemical Entity Mention in Patents (CEMP) recognition task and a Chemical Passage Detection (CPD) classification task. We addressed both tasks by an ensemble system that combines a dictionary-based approach with a statistical one. For this purpose the performance of several lexical resources was assessed using Peregrine, our open-source indexing engine. We combined our dictionary-based results on the patent corpus with the results of tmChem, a chemical recognizer using a conditional random field classifier. To improve the performance of tmChem, we utilized three additional features, viz. part-of-speech tags, lemmas and word-vector clusters. When evaluated on the training data, our final system obtained an F-score of 85.21% for the CEMP task, and an accuracy of 91.53% for the CPD task. On the test set, the best system ranked sixth among 21 teams for CEMP with an F-score of 86.82%, and second among nine teams for CPD with an accuracy of 94.23%. The differences in performance between the best ensemble system and the statistical system separately were small. Database URL: http://biosemantics.org/chemdner-patents PMID:27141091

Correlation between electrical, mechanical and chemical properties of fresh and used aircraft engine oils

Science.gov (United States)

Gajewski, Juliusz B.; Głogowski, Marek J.; Paszkowski, Maciej; Czarnik-Matusewicz, Bogusława

2011-06-01

In this paper the results are presented of measurements of electrical, mechanical and chemical properties of fresh and used aircraft engine oils. Oils were used in a four-stroke aircraft engine and their samples were taken after the 50-hour work of the engine. The resistivity, permittivity and viscosity of oils were measured as a function of temperature. Additionally, some measurements of the absorbance spectra and size of particles contained in the oils were carried out. The significant reduction in the resistivity of the used Total oil was observed. The relative permittivity of both used oils was slightly increased. The oil's relative viscosity depends on temperature of oil and given time that elapsed from the very first moment when the shear force was applied in a rheometer. The results obtained allowed one to identify more precisely the chemical and physico-chemical interactions occurring in the tested samples, as compared with a typical infrared spectroscopy.

Correlation between electrical, mechanical and chemical properties of fresh and used aircraft engine oils

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Gajewski, Juliusz B; Glogowski, Marek J; Paszkowski, Maciej; Czarnik-Matusewicz, Boguslawa

2011-01-01

In this paper the results are presented of measurements of electrical, mechanical and chemical properties of fresh and used aircraft engine oils. Oils were used in a four-stroke aircraft engine and their samples were taken after the 50-hour work of the engine. The resistivity, permittivity and viscosity of oils were measured as a function of temperature. Additionally, some measurements of the absorbance spectra and size of particles contained in the oils were carried out. The significant reduction in the resistivity of the used Total oil was observed. The relative permittivity of both used oils was slightly increased. The oil's relative viscosity depends on temperature of oil and given time that elapsed from the very first moment when the shear force was applied in a rheometer. The results obtained allowed one to identify more precisely the chemical and physico-chemical interactions occurring in the tested samples, as compared with a typical infrared spectroscopy.

Recent advances in rational approaches for enzyme engineering

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Kerstin Steiner

2012-09-01

Full Text Available Enzymes are an attractive alternative in the asymmetric syntheses of chiral building blocks. To meet the requirements of industrial biotechnology and to introduce new functionalities, the enzymes need to be optimized by protein engineering. This article specifically reviews rational approaches for enzyme engineering and de novo enzyme design involving structure-based approaches developed in recent years for improvement of the enzymes’ performance, broadened substrate range, and creation of novel functionalities to obtain products with high added value for industrial applications.

Fueling Chemical Engineering Concepts with Biodiesel Production: A Professional Development Experience for High School Pre-Service Teachers

Science.gov (United States)

Gupta, Anju

2015-01-01

This one-day workshop for pre-service teachers was aimed at implementing a uniquely designed and ready-to-implement chemical engineering curriculum in high school coursework. This educational and professional development opportunity introduced: 1) chemical engineering curriculum and career opportunities, 2) basic industrial processes and flow…

Online Data Resources in Chemical Engineering Education: Impact of the Uncertainty Concept for Thermophysical Properties

Science.gov (United States)

Kim, Sun Hyung; Kang, Jeong Won; Kroenlein, Kenneth; Magee, Joseph W.; Diky, Vladimir; Muzny, Chris D.; Kazakov, Andrei F.; Chirico, Robert D.; Frenkel, Michael

2013-01-01

We review the concept of uncertainty for thermophysical properties and its critical impact for engineering applications in the core courses of chemical engineering education. To facilitate the translation of developments to engineering education, we employ NIST Web Thermo Tables to furnish properties data with their associated expanded…

Chemically engineering ligand selectivity at the free fatty acid receptor 2 based on pharmacological variation between species orthologs

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Hudson, Brian D; Christiansen, Elisabeth; Tikhonova, Irina G

2012-01-01

When it is difficult to develop selective ligands within a family of related G-protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs), chemically engineered receptors activated solely by synthetic ligands (RASSLs) are useful alternatives for probing receptor function. In the present work, we explored whether a RASSL...... on this receptor and demonstrates that exploitation of pharmacological variation between species orthologs is a powerful method to generate novel chemically engineered GPCRs.-Hudson, B. D., Christiansen, E., Tikhonova, I. G., Grundmann, M., Kostenis, E., Adams, D. R., Ulven, T., Milligan, G. Chemically engineering...

High-Performance Liquid Chromatography in the Undergraduate Chemical Engineering Laboratory

Science.gov (United States)

Frey, Douglas D.; Guo, Hui; Karnik, Nikhila

2013-01-01

This article describes the assembly of a simple, low-cost, high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) system and its use in the undergraduate chemical engineering laboratory course to perform simple experiments. By interpreting the results from these experiments students are able to gain significant experience in the general method of…

Metabolic engineering of strains: from industrial-scale to lab-scale chemical production.

Science.gov (United States)

Sun, Jie; Alper, Hal S

2015-03-01

A plethora of successful metabolic engineering case studies have been published over the past several decades. Here, we highlight a collection of microbially produced chemicals using a historical framework, starting with titers ranging from industrial scale (more than 50 g/L), to medium-scale (5-50 g/L), and lab-scale (0-5 g/L). Although engineered Escherichia coli and Saccharomyces cerevisiae emerge as prominent hosts in the literature as a result of well-developed genetic engineering tools, several novel native-producing strains are gaining attention. This review catalogs the current progress of metabolic engineering towards production of compounds such as acids, alcohols, amino acids, natural organic compounds, and others.

Engineering Microbial Chemical Factories to Produce Renewable ‘Biomonomers’

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Jake eAdkins

2012-08-01

Full Text Available By applying metabolic engineering tools and strategies to engineer synthetic enzyme pathways, the number and diversity of commodity and specialty chemicals that can be derived directly from renewable feedstocks is rapidly and continually expanding. This of course includes a number of monomer building-block chemicals that can be used to produce replacements to many conventional plastic materials. This review aims to highlight numerous recent and important advancements in the microbial production of these so-called ‘biomonomers’. Relative to naturally-occurring renewable bioplastics, biomonomers offer several important advantages, including improved control over the final polymer structure and purity, the ability to synthesize non-natural copolymers, and allowing products to be excreted from cells which ultimately streamlines downstream recovery and purification. To highlight these features, a handful of biomonomers have been selected as illustrative examples of recent works, including polyamide monomers, styrenic vinyls, hydroxyacids, and diols. Where appropriate, examples of their industrial penetration to date and end-product uses are also highlighted. Novel biomonomers such as these are ultimately paving the way towards new classes of renewable bioplastics that possess a broader diversity of properties than ever before possible.

Engineering microbial chemical factories to produce renewable “biomonomers”

Science.gov (United States)

Adkins, Jake; Pugh, Shawn; McKenna, Rebekah; Nielsen, David R.

2012-01-01

By applying metabolic engineering tools and strategies to engineer synthetic enzyme pathways, the number and diversity of commodity and specialty chemicals that can be derived directly from renewable feedstocks is rapidly and continually expanding. This of course includes a number of monomer building-block chemicals that can be used to produce replacements to many conventional plastic materials. This review aims to highlight numerous recent and important advancements in the microbial production of these so-called “biomonomers.” Relative to naturally-occurring renewable bioplastics, biomonomers offer several important advantages, including improved control over the final polymer structure and purity, the ability to synthesize non-natural copolymers, and allowing products to be excreted from cells which ultimately streamlines downstream recovery and purification. To highlight these features, a handful of biomonomers have been selected as illustrative examples of recent works, including polyamide monomers, styrenic vinyls, hydroxyacids, and diols. Where appropriate, examples of their industrial penetration to date and end-product uses are also highlighted. Novel biomonomers such as these are ultimately paving the way toward new classes of renewable bioplastics that possess a broader diversity of properties than ever before possible. PMID:22969753

Toward systems metabolic engineering of Aspergillus and Pichia species for the production of chemicals and biofuels

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Caspeta, Luis; Nielsen, Jens

2013-01-01

trends in systems biology of Aspergillus and Pichia species, highlighting the relevance of these developments for systems metabolic engineering of these organisms for the production of hydrolytic enzymes, biofuels and chemicals from biomass. Metabolic engineering is moving from traditional methods...... for the production of hydrolytic enzymes, biofuels and chemicals from biomass. © 2013 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim....

Fluid flow for chemical and process engineers

CERN Document Server

Holland, F

1995-01-01

This major new edition of a popular undergraduate text covers topics of interest to chemical engineers taking courses on fluid flow. These topics include non-Newtonian flow, gas-liquid two-phase flow, pumping and mixing. It expands on the explanations of principles given in the first edition and is more self-contained. Two strong features of the first edition were the extensive derivation of equations and worked examples to illustrate calculation procedures. These have been retained. A new extended introductory chapter has been provided to give the student a thorough basis to understand the methods covered in subsequent chapters.

Some radiation chemical aspects of nuclear engineering

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Pikaev, A.K.; Kabakchi, S.A.; Egorov, G.F.

1988-01-01

Some radiation chemical aspects of nuclear engineering are discussed (predominantly on the base of the works performed in the Soviet Union). The data on the influence of temperature within the range of 0-300 0 C on the yields of water radiolysis products are considered. The results obtained from the study of reactivity of actinide ions towards inorganic free radicals in acid aqueous solutions are summarized. The information on composition and properties of the products of radiolytic transformations of different extragents and diluents and on their influence on the behaviour of extraction systems during processing of irradiated nuclear fuel is presented. (author)

Application of Plagiarism Screening Software in the Chemical Engineering Curriculum

Science.gov (United States)

Cooper, Matthew E.; Bullard, Lisa G.

2014-01-01

Plagiarism is an area of increasing concern for written ChE assignments, such as laboratory and design reports, due to ease of access to text and other materials via the internet. This study examines the application of plagiarism screening software to four courses in a university chemical engineering curriculum. The effectiveness of plagiarism…

Teaching Technical Writing in a Lab Course in Chemical Engineering

Science.gov (United States)

Lombardo, Stephen J.

2010-01-01

Techniques are presented for improving the technical writing of chemical engineering students enrolled in an undergraduate laboratory course. The principles of writing covered are adopted from the book, Style: Lessons in Clarity and Grace, by Joseph M. Williams: General examples of writing are taken from this book and then are recast into examples…

Enterprise architecture approach to mining companies engineering

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Ilin’ Igor

2017-01-01

Full Text Available As Russian economy is still largely oriented on commodities production, there are a lot of cities where mining and commodity-oriented enterprises are the backbone of city economy. The mentioned enterprises mostly define the life quality of citizens in such cities, thus there are high requirements for engineering of city-forming enterprises. The paper describes the enterprise architecture approach for management system engineering of the mining enterprises. The paper contains the model of the mining enterprise architecture, the approach to the development and implementation of an integrated management system based on the concept of enterprise architecture and the structure of information systems and information technology infrastructure of the mining enterprise.

Y2K of the society of chemical engineers, Japan; Kagaku kogakukai no 2000nen mondai

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Kataoka, K. [Kobe University, Kobe (Japan)

2000-01-05

In this paper, the coming problem of the Y2K problems by the cataclysm of economic society that the Society of Chemical Engineers holds is described. And it is explained in dividing into the present problems for the development of the Society of Chemical Engineers, a science and technology promotion policy, a university/industry cooperation, a regional cooperation, an internationality and international contribution, an effect of an independent administrative corporation of national universities, the movement of a future plan, the terms of member needs and a base establishment. In the paragraph of the movement of a future plan, the facts that a basic philosophy of the Society of Chemical Engineers was suggested standing on the report of the Vision Settlement Preparation Committee organized in 1998, the Chemical Industry Vision 2011 Settlement Committee was inaugurated for constituting its future images and the Working Group composed of the members of the Industry Institute in their forties leading the next generation was established is introduced. (NEDO)

Broadening of nuclear engineering programs: An engineering physics approach at Rensselaer

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Malaviya, B.K.

1990-01-01

With the maturing of nuclear engineering as an academic discipline and the uncertainty surrounding the nuclear industry, attention is being increasingly turned to ways in which the base of traditional nuclear engineering programs in universities can be broadened to make them more attractively useful to a wider class of potential students and employers while maintaining the strengths in mainstream areas of nuclear technology. An approach that seems to provide a natural evolution combining the existing programmatic strengths, infrastructure, and resources with the trending needs of a broad segment of diversified industries is the development and initiation of an engineering physics degree program as an adjunct to an established nuclear engineering curriculum. In line with these developments, a new comprehensive academic program offering baccalaureate, master's, and doctoral degrees in engineering physics has been developed and formally instituted at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI). It provides a valuable opportunity for students to pursue education and research that cuts across traditional disciplinary lines, leading to a wide variety of career opportunities in industry, government, national research and defense laboratories, and academia

Metabolic engineering in chemolithoautotrophic hosts for the production of fuels and chemicals.

Science.gov (United States)

Nybo, S Eric; Khan, Nymul E; Woolston, Benjamin M; Curtis, Wayne R

2015-07-01

The ability of autotrophic organisms to fix CO2 presents an opportunity to utilize this 'greenhouse gas' as an inexpensive substrate for biochemical production. Unlike conventional heterotrophic microorganisms that consume carbohydrates and amino acids, prokaryotic chemolithoautotrophs have evolved the capacity to utilize reduced chemical compounds to fix CO2 and drive metabolic processes. The use of chemolithoautotrophic hosts as production platforms has been renewed by the prospect of metabolically engineered commodity chemicals and fuels. Efforts such as the ARPA-E electrofuels program highlight both the potential and obstacles that chemolithoautotrophic biosynthetic platforms provide. This review surveys the numerous advances that have been made in chemolithoautotrophic metabolic engineering with a focus on hydrogen oxidizing bacteria such as the model chemolithoautotrophic organism (Ralstonia), the purple photosynthetic bacteria (Rhodobacter), and anaerobic acetogens. Two alternative strategies of microbial chassis development are considered: (1) introducing or enhancing autotrophic capabilities (carbon fixation, hydrogen utilization) in model heterotrophic organisms, or (2) improving tools for pathway engineering (transformation methods, promoters, vectors etc.) in native autotrophic organisms. Unique characteristics of autotrophic growth as they relate to bioreactor design and process development are also discussed in the context of challenges and opportunities for genetic manipulation of organisms as production platforms. Copyright © 2015 International Metabolic Engineering Society. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

An Innovative Approach for online Meta Search Engine Optimization

OpenAIRE

Manral, Jai; Hossain, Mohammed Alamgir

2015-01-01

This paper presents an approach to identify efficient techniques used in Web Search Engine Optimization (SEO). Understanding SEO factors which can influence page ranking in search engine is significant for webmasters who wish to attract large number of users to their website. Different from previous relevant research, in this study we developed an intelligent Meta search engine which aggregates results from various search engines and ranks them based on several important SEO parameters. The r...

Virtual Chemical Engineering: Guidelines for E-Learning in Engineering Education

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Damian Schofield

2010-11-01

Full Text Available Advanced three-dimensional virtual environment technology, similar to that used by the film and computer games industry can allow educational developers to rapidly create realistic three-dimensional, virtual environments. This technology has been used to generate a range of interactive learning environments across a broad spectrum of industries.The paper will discuss the implementation of these systems and extrapolate the lessons learnt into general guidelines to be considered for the development of a range of educational learning resources. These guidelines will then be discussed in the context of the development of ViRILE (Virtual Reality Interactive Learning Environment, software which simulates the configuration and operation of a polymerisation plant. This software package has been developed for use by undergraduate chemical engineers at the University of Nottingham.

Chemical engineering design of CO oxidation catalysts

Science.gov (United States)

Herz, Richard K.

1987-01-01

How a chemical reaction engineer would approach the challenge of designing a CO oxidation catalyst for pulsed CO2 lasers is described. CO oxidation catalysts have a long history of application, of course, so it is instructive to first consider the special requirements of the laser application and then to compare them to the characteristics of existing processes which utilize CO oxidation catalysts. All CO2 laser applications require a CO oxidation catalyst with the following characteristics: (1) active at stoichiometric ratios of O2 and CO, (2) no inhibition by CO2 or other components of the laser environment, (3) releases no particulates during vibration or thermal cycling, and (4) long lifetime with a stable activity. In all applications, low consumption of power is desirable, a characteristic especially critical in aerospace applications and, thus, catalyst activity at low temperatures is highly desirable. High power lasers with high pulse repetition rates inherently require circulation of the gas mixture and this forced circulation is available for moving gas past the catalyst. Low repetition rate lasers, however, do not inherently require gas circulation, so a catalyst that did not require such circulation would be favorable from the standpoint of minimum power consumption. Lasers designed for atmospheric penetration of their infrared radiation utilize CO2 formed from rare isotopes of oxygen and this application has the additional constraint that normal abundance oxygen isotopes in the catalyst must not exchange with rare isotopes in the gas mixture.

Energy and environmental challenges to chemical engineers

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

McHenry, K.W.

1991-01-01

The National Research Council's report, Frontiers in Chemical Engineering, was written four years ago. Three high-priority research areas concerned with energy and the environment were identified in the report: in situ processing, liquid fuels for the future, and responsible management of hazardous wastes. As outlined in the recently released National Energy Strategy, in situ processing is viewed by the Department of Energy (DOE) primarily through its use in enhanced oil recovery, and some research is still funded. Industry, driven by the economics of low oil prices, is doing little research on in situ processing but much more on reservoir characterization, a prerequisite to processing. Research on liquid fuels for the future is driven more by environmental concerns now than by energy security concerns. It appears to be wise policy for the future to try to solve the alternative fuel problem as quickly and simply as possible. Otherwise, the nation will find itself with a costly and complex fuel and vehicle system that may have to be changed again in a generation. For the interim, we should look closely at reformulated gasoline followed by compressed natural gas, if necessary. In the long run, vehicle systems based on electricity seem most promising for the middle of the next century. To deliver this technology we need to capitalize on three new high-priority research areas: batteries, fuel cells, and nuclear power. For chemical engineers, future challenges of a different sort will be added to the technical challenges, among them are explaining to a skeptical public the wisdom of proceeding to design the interim system of alternative fuel(s) and to move expeditiously to a final solution

Nanoparticles for bone tissue engineering.

Science.gov (United States)

Vieira, Sílvia; Vial, Stephanie; Reis, Rui L; Oliveira, J Miguel

2017-05-01

Tissue engineering (TE) envisions the creation of functional substitutes for damaged tissues through integrated solutions, where medical, biological, and engineering principles are combined. Bone regeneration is one of the areas in which designing a model that mimics all tissue properties is still a challenge. The hierarchical structure and high vascularization of bone hampers a TE approach, especially in large bone defects. Nanotechnology can open up a new era for TE, allowing the creation of nanostructures that are comparable in size to those appearing in natural bone. Therefore, nanoengineered systems are now able to more closely mimic the structures observed in naturally occurring systems, and it is also possible to combine several approaches - such as drug delivery and cell labeling - within a single system. This review aims to cover the most recent developments on the use of different nanoparticles for bone TE, with emphasis on their application for scaffolds improvement; drug and gene delivery carriers, and labeling techniques. © 2017 American Institute of Chemical Engineers Biotechnol. Prog., 33:590-611, 2017. © 2017 American Institute of Chemical Engineers.

Chemical entity recognition in patents by combining dictionary-based and statistical approaches.

Science.gov (United States)

Akhondi, Saber A; Pons, Ewoud; Afzal, Zubair; van Haagen, Herman; Becker, Benedikt F H; Hettne, Kristina M; van Mulligen, Erik M; Kors, Jan A

2016-01-01

We describe the development of a chemical entity recognition system and its application in the CHEMDNER-patent track of BioCreative 2015. This community challenge includes a Chemical Entity Mention in Patents (CEMP) recognition task and a Chemical Passage Detection (CPD) classification task. We addressed both tasks by an ensemble system that combines a dictionary-based approach with a statistical one. For this purpose the performance of several lexical resources was assessed using Peregrine, our open-source indexing engine. We combined our dictionary-based results on the patent corpus with the results of tmChem, a chemical recognizer using a conditional random field classifier. To improve the performance of tmChem, we utilized three additional features, viz. part-of-speech tags, lemmas and word-vector clusters. When evaluated on the training data, our final system obtained an F-score of 85.21% for the CEMP task, and an accuracy of 91.53% for the CPD task. On the test set, the best system ranked sixth among 21 teams for CEMP with an F-score of 86.82%, and second among nine teams for CPD with an accuracy of 94.23%. The differences in performance between the best ensemble system and the statistical system separately were small.Database URL: http://biosemantics.org/chemdner-patents. © The Author(s) 2016. Published by Oxford University Press.

Chemical engineering challenges in driving thermochemical hydrogen processes with the tandem mirror reactor

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Galloway, T.R.; Werner, R.W.

1980-01-01

The Tandem Mirror Reactor is described and compared with Tokamaks, both from a basic physics viewpoint and from the suitability of the respective reactor for synfuel production. Differences and similarities between the TMR as an electricity producer or a synfuel producer are also cited. The Thermochemical cycle chosen to link with the fusion energy source is the General Atomic Sulfur-Iodine Cycle, which is a purely thermal-driven process with no electrochemical steps. There are real chemical engineering challenges of getting this high quality heat into the large thermochemical plant in an efficient manner. We illustrate with some of our approaches to providing process heat via liquid sodium to drive a 1050 K, highly-endothermic, catalytic and fluidized-bed SO 3 Decomposition Reactor. The technical, economic, and safety tradeoffs that arise are discussed

Nonlinear approaches in engineering applications applied mechanics, vibration control, and numerical analysis

CERN Document Server

Jazar, Reza

2015-01-01

This book focuses on the latest applications of nonlinear approaches in different disciplines of engineering. For each selected topic, detailed concept development, derivations, and relevant knowledge are provided for the convenience of the readers. The topics range from dynamic systems and control to optimal approaches in nonlinear dynamics. The volume includes invited chapters from world class experts in the field. The selected topics are of great interest in the fields of engineering and physics and this book is ideal for engineers and researchers working in a broad range of practical topics and approaches. This book also: ·         Explores the most up-to-date applications and underlying principles of nonlinear approaches to problems in engineering and physics, including sections on analytic nonlinearity and practical nonlinearity ·         Enlightens readers to the conceptual significance of nonlinear approaches with examples of applications in scientific and engineering problems from v...

Impact of synthetic biology and metabolic engineering on industrial production of fine chemicals

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Jullesson, David; David, Florian; Pfleger, Brian

2015-01-01

Industrial bio-processes for fine chemical production are increasingly relying on cell factories developed through metabolic engineering and synthetic biology. The use of high throughput techniques and automation for the design of cell factories, and especially platform strains, has played...... chemicals that have reached the market, key metabolic engineering tools that have allowed this to happen and some of the companies that are currently utilizing these technologies for developing industrial production processes....... an important role in the transition from laboratory research to industrial production. Model organisms such as Saccharomyces cerevisiae and Escherichia coli remain widely used host strains for industrial production due to their robust and desirable traits. This review describes some of the bio-based fine...

A Novel Evolutionary Engineering Design Approach for Mixed-Domain Systems

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Fan, Zhun; Hu, J.; Seo, K.

2004-01-01

This paper presents an approach to engineering design of mixed-domain dynamic systems. The approach aims at system-level design and has two key features: first, it generates engineering designs that satisfy predefined specifications in an automatic manner; second, it can design systems belonging ...... often encountered in evolutionary computation, a HFC (Hierarchical Fair Competition) model is adopted in this work. Examples of an analog filter design and a MEM filter design illustrate the application of the approach....

Sundanese ancient manuscripts search engine using probability approach

Science.gov (United States)

Suryani, Mira; Hadi, Setiawan; Paulus, Erick; Nurma Yulita, Intan; Supriatna, Asep K.

2017-10-01

Today, Information and Communication Technology (ICT) has become a regular thing for every aspect of live include cultural and heritage aspect. Sundanese ancient manuscripts as Sundanese heritage are in damage condition and also the information that containing on it. So in order to preserve the information in Sundanese ancient manuscripts and make them easier to search, a search engine has been developed. The search engine must has good computing ability. In order to get the best computation in developed search engine, three types of probabilistic approaches: Bayesian Networks Model, Divergence from Randomness with PL2 distribution, and DFR-PL2F as derivative form DFR-PL2 have been compared in this study. The three probabilistic approaches supported by index of documents and three different weighting methods: term occurrence, term frequency, and TF-IDF. The experiment involved 12 Sundanese ancient manuscripts. From 12 manuscripts there are 474 distinct terms. The developed search engine tested by 50 random queries for three types of query. The experiment results showed that for the single query and multiple query, the best searching performance given by the combination of PL2F approach and TF-IDF weighting method. The performance has been evaluated using average time responds with value about 0.08 second and Mean Average Precision (MAP) about 0.33.

Repurposing Mass-produced Internal Combustion Engines Quantifying the Value and Use of Low-cost Internal Combustion Piston Engines for Modular Applications in Energy and Chemical Engineering Industries

Science.gov (United States)

L'Heureux, Zara E.

This thesis proposes that internal combustion piston engines can help clear the way for a transformation in the energy, chemical, and refining industries that is akin to the transition computer technology experienced with the shift from large mainframes to small personal computers and large farms of individually small, modular processing units. This thesis provides a mathematical foundation, multi-dimensional optimizations, experimental results, an engine model, and a techno-economic assessment, all working towards quantifying the value of repurposing internal combustion piston engines for new applications in modular, small-scale technologies, particularly for energy and chemical engineering systems. Many chemical engineering and power generation industries have focused on increasing individual unit sizes and centralizing production. This "bigger is better" concept makes it difficult to evolve and incorporate change. Large systems are often designed with long lifetimes, incorporate innovation slowly, and necessitate high upfront investment costs. Breaking away from this cycle is essential for promoting change, especially change happening quickly in the energy and chemical engineering industries. The ability to evolve during a system's lifetime provides a competitive advantage in a field dominated by large and often very old equipment that cannot respond to technology change. This thesis specifically highlights the value of small, mass-manufactured internal combustion piston engines retrofitted to participate in non-automotive system designs. The applications are unconventional and stem first from the observation that, when normalized by power output, internal combustion engines are one hundred times less expensive than conventional, large power plants. This cost disparity motivated a look at scaling laws to determine if scaling across both individual unit size and number of units produced would predict the two order of magnitude difference seen here. For the first

Automatic differentiation tools in the dynamic simulation of chemical engineering processes

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Castro M.C.

2000-01-01

Full Text Available Automatic Differentiation is a relatively recent technique developed for the differentiation of functions applicable directly to the source code to compute the function written in standard programming languages. That technique permits the automatization of the differentiation step, crucial for dynamic simulation and optimization of processes. The values for the derivatives obtained with AD are exact (to roundoff. The theoretical exactness of the AD comes from the fact that it uses the same rules of differentiation as in differential calculus, but these rules are applied to an algorithmic specification of the function rather than to a formula. The main purpose of this contribution is to discuss the impact of Automatic Differentiation in the field of dynamic simulation of chemical engineering processes. The influence of the differentiation technique on the behavior of the integration code, the performance of the generated code and the incorporation of AD tools in consistent initialization tools are discussed from the viewpoint of dynamic simulation of typical models in chemical engineering.

Materials of 46. Scientific Assembly of Polish Chemical Society and Association of Engineers and Technicians of Chemical. Volume 1,2,3

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

2003-01-01

Scientific assemblies of Polish Chemical Society are the most important chemical meetings organised annually in Poland. Basic as well as application studies in all chemical branches have been extensively presented. The next subjects were proposed as scientific sessions and symposia topics: organic chemistry, inorganic chemistry, physical chemistry, analytical chemistry, technology and chemical engineering, polymer chemistry, solid state chemistry, catalysis, biological chemistry, chemistry and technology of coal, environmental protection, didactics of chemistry, history of chemistry, young scientist forum as well as the reports of results of works sponsored by Committee of Scientific Research

An Integrated Neuroscience and Engineering Approach to Classifying Human Brain-States

Science.gov (United States)

2015-12-22

AFRL-AFOSR-VA-TR-2016-0037 An Integrated Neuroscience and Engineering Approach to Classifying Human Brain-States Adrian Lee UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON...to 14-09-2015 4. TITLE AND SUBTITLE An Integrated Neuroscience and Engineering Approach to Classifying Human Brain- States 5a.  CONTRACT NUMBER 5b...specific cognitive states remains elusive, owing perhaps to limited crosstalk between the fields of neuroscience and engineering. Here, we report a

["Two professions for a single task". The introduction of chemical engineering in Spain during the first Francoism].

Science.gov (United States)

Toca, Angel

2006-01-01

Through the first half of the 20th century, chemical engineering was established as an academic option in the training of specialists for the North-American and European chemical industry, whereas it was not a special field of study in Spain until the 1990s. The reason for this delay was a battle of interests between chemist and industrial engineers to control this career during the first Francoism. This article will try to show the development and professionalization of specialists for the Spanish chemical industry.

Integrated approaches to spatiotemporally directing angiogenesis in host and engineered tissues.

Science.gov (United States)

Kant, Rajeev J; Coulombe, Kareen L K

2018-03-15

The field of tissue engineering has turned towards biomimicry to solve the problem of tissue oxygenation and nutrient/waste exchange through the development of vasculature. Induction of angiogenesis and subsequent development of a vascular bed in engineered tissues is actively being pursued through combinations of physical and chemical cues, notably through the presentation of topographies and growth factors. Presenting angiogenic signals in a spatiotemporal fashion is beginning to generate improved vascular networks, which will allow for the creation of large and dense engineered tissues. This review provides a brief background on the cells, mechanisms, and molecules driving vascular development (including angiogenesis), followed by how biomaterials and growth factors can be used to direct vessel formation and maturation. Techniques to accomplish spatiotemporal control of vascularization include incorporation or encapsulation of growth factors, topographical engineering, and 3D bioprinting. The vascularization of engineered tissues and their application in angiogenic therapy in vivo is reviewed herein with an emphasis on the most densely vascularized tissue of the human body - the heart. Vascularization is vital to wound healing and tissue regeneration, and development of hierarchical networks enables efficient nutrient transfer. In tissue engineering, vascularization is necessary to support physiologically dense engineered tissues, and thus the field seeks to induce vascular formation using biomaterials and chemical signals to provide appropriate, pro-angiogenic signals for cells. This review critically examines the materials and techniques used to generate scaffolds with spatiotemporal cues to direct vascularization in engineered and host tissues in vitro and in vivo. Assessment of the field's progress is intended to inspire vascular applications across all forms of tissue engineering with a specific focus on highlighting the nuances of cardiac tissue

English Language Publishing in Chemical Engineering Journals from an Indian Academic's Point of View--A Broad Scientific Perspective

Science.gov (United States)

Palit, Sukanchan

2016-01-01

Scientific vision and scientific understanding in today's world are in the path of new glory. Chemical Engineering science is witnessing drastic and rapid changes. The metamorphosis of human civilization in this century is faced with vicious challenges. Progress of Chemical Engineering science, the vision of technology and the broad chemical…

Abstracts of the 47. Canadian chemical engineering conference

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

1997-01-01

Chemical engineering and its role in the development of Western Canada's oil sands and heavy oil reserves was the main focus of this conference. The presentations revolved around the theme, 'The Competitive Advantage'. Features of the conference included strong participation by industry, professional development courses, and government. Energy-related sessions were entitled: (1) oil and bitumen recovery, (2) bitumen extraction and froth treatment, (3) bitumen upgrading, (4) in-situ recovery and enhanced oil recovery, (5) air quality, (6) cracking and hydrogenation, and (7) sulfur recovery and gas processing

Conservation of Life as a Unifying Theme for Process Safety in Chemical Engineering Education

Science.gov (United States)

Klein, James A.; Davis, Richard A.

2011-01-01

This paper explores the use of "conservation of life" as a concept and unifying theme for increasing awareness, application, and integration of process safety in chemical engineering education. Students need to think of conservation of mass, conservation of energy, and conservation of life as equally important in engineering design and analysis.…

CURRICULUM: A Chemical Engineering Course for Liberal Arts Students--Indigo: A World of Blues

Science.gov (United States)

Piergiovanni, Polly R.

2012-01-01

Sophomore liberal arts and engineering students enrolled in a course to learn and practice some basic chemical engineering side by side. The course was developed around the theme of indigo dyeing, which has an interesting history, fascinating chemistry and is accessible to all students. The students participated in a variety of active learning…

Distributed simulation a model driven engineering approach

CERN Document Server

Topçu, Okan; Oğuztüzün, Halit; Yilmaz, Levent

2016-01-01

Backed by substantive case studies, the novel approach to software engineering for distributed simulation outlined in this text demonstrates the potent synergies between model-driven techniques, simulation, intelligent agents, and computer systems development.

Teaching Population Balances for Chemical Engineering Students: Application to Granulation Processes

Science.gov (United States)

Bucala, Veronica; Pina, Juliana

2007-01-01

The population balance equation (PBE) is a useful tool to predict particle size distributions in granulation processes. When PBE is taught to advanced chemical engineering students, the internal coordinates (particle properties) are particularly hard to understand. In this paper, the flow of particles along different coordinates is carefully…

Production of amino acids - Genetic and metabolic engineering approaches.

Science.gov (United States)

Lee, Jin-Ho; Wendisch, Volker F

2017-12-01

The biotechnological production of amino acids occurs at the million-ton scale and annually about 6milliontons of l-glutamate and l-lysine are produced by Escherichia coli and Corynebacterium glutamicum strains. l-glutamate and l-lysine production from starch hydrolysates and molasses is very efficient and access to alternative carbon sources and new products has been enabled by metabolic engineering. This review focusses on genetic and metabolic engineering of amino acid producing strains. In particular, rational approaches involving modulation of transcriptional regulators, regulons, and attenuators will be discussed. To address current limitations of metabolic engineering, this article gives insights on recent systems metabolic engineering approaches based on functional tools and method such as genome reduction, amino acid sensors based on transcriptional regulators and riboswitches, CRISPR interference, small regulatory RNAs, DNA scaffolding, and optogenetic control, and discusses future prospects. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Massachusetts Institute of Technology School of Chemical Engineering Practice, Brookhaven station: Summary of projects, 1983-1986

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

1987-11-01

The MIT Graduate School of Chemical Engineering Practice stresses engineering problem solving. The Practice School program, as it is commonly called, develops in a unique and particularly effective way the student's ability to apply fundamentals to problems in the chemical industry and thus accelerates one's professional development. The themes of atomization, emthanol production and utilization, hydrogen production and compression, localized electrochemical corrosion and biochemical engineering reflect some of the major programs at the Laboratory. The titles of all the projects are listed in chronological order in the index at the end of this document. Brief summaries are presented for each project with related projects grouped together

A stochastic approach to chemical evolution

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Copi, C.J.

1997-01-01

Observations of elemental abundances in the Galaxy have repeatedly shown an intrinsic scatter as a function of time and metallicity. The standard approach to chemical evolution does not attempt to address this scatter in abundances since only the mean evolution is followed. In this work, the scatter is addressed via a stochastic approach to solving chemical evolution models. Three simple chemical evolution scenarios are studied using this stochastic approach: a closed box model, an infall model, and an outflow model. These models are solved for the solar neighborhood in a Monte Carlo fashion. The evolutionary history of one particular region is determined randomly based on the star formation rate and the initial mass function. Following the evolution in an ensemble of such regions leads to the predicted spread in abundances expected, based solely on different evolutionary histories of otherwise identical regions. In this work, 13 isotopes are followed, including the light elements, the CNO elements, a few α-elements, and iron. It is found that the predicted spread in abundances for a 10 5 M circle-dot region is in good agreement with observations for the α-elements. For CN, the agreement is not as good, perhaps indicating the need for more physics input for low-mass stellar evolution. Similarly for the light elements, the predicted scatter is quite small, which is in contradiction to the observations of 3 He in HII regions. The models are tuned for the solar neighborhood so that good agreement with HII regions is not expected. This has important implications for low-mass stellar evolution and on using chemical evolution to determine the primordial light-element abundances in order to test big bang nucleosynthesis. copyright 1997 The American Astronomical Society

Mass spectral chemical fingerprints reveal the molecular dependence of exhaust particulate matters on engine speeds.

Science.gov (United States)

Li, Yi; Zhang, Hua; Zhao, Zongshan; Tian, Yong; Liu, Kun; Jie, Feifan; Zhu, Liang; Chen, Huanwen

2018-05-01

Particulate matters (PMs) emitted by automobile exhaust contribute to a significant fraction of the global PMs. Extractive atmospheric pressure chemical ionization mass spectrometry (EAPCI-MS) was developed to explore the molecular dependence of PMs collected from exhaust gases produced at different vehicle engine speeds. The mass spectral fingerprints of the organic compounds embedded in differentially sized PMs (e.g., 0.22-0.45, 0.45-1.00, 1.00-2.00, 2.00-3.00, 3.00-5.00, and 5.00-10.00μm) generated at different engine speeds (e.g., 1000, 1500, 2000, 2500, and 3000r/min) were chemically profiled in the mass range of mass to charge ratio (m/z) 50-800. Organic compounds, including alcohols, aldehydes, and esters, were detected in all the PMs tested, with varied concentration levels for each individual PM sample. At relatively low engine speeds (≤1500r/min), the total amount of organic species embedded in PMs of 0.22-1.00μm was greater than in PMs of other sizes, while more organic species were found in PMs of 5.00-10.00μm at high engine speeds (≥3000r/min), indicating that the organic compounds distributed in different sizes of PMs strongly correlated with the engine speed. The experimental data showed that the EAPCI-MS technique enables molecular characterization of PMs in exhaust, revealing the chemical dependence of PMs on the engine speeds (i.e., the combustion conditions) of automobiles. Copyright © 2017. Published by Elsevier B.V.

Helicopter Gas Turbine Engine Performance Analysis : A Multivariable Approach

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Arush, Ilan; Pavel, M.D.

2017-01-01

Helicopter performance relies heavily on the available output power of the engine(s) installed. A simplistic single-variable analysis approach is often used within the flight-testing community to reduce raw flight-test data in order to predict the available output power under different atmospheric

Synthetic biology approaches to engineer T cells.

Science.gov (United States)

Wu, Chia-Yung; Rupp, Levi J; Roybal, Kole T; Lim, Wendell A

2015-08-01

There is rapidly growing interest in learning how to engineer immune cells, such as T lymphocytes, because of the potential of these engineered cells to be used for therapeutic applications such as the recognition and killing of cancer cells. At the same time, our knowhow and capability to logically engineer cellular behavior is growing rapidly with the development of synthetic biology. Here we describe how synthetic biology approaches are being used to rationally alter the behavior of T cells to optimize them for therapeutic functions. We also describe future developments that will be important in order to construct safe and precise T cell therapeutics. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Impact of synthetic biology and metabolic engineering on industrial production of fine chemicals.

Science.gov (United States)

Jullesson, David; David, Florian; Pfleger, Brian; Nielsen, Jens

2015-11-15

Industrial bio-processes for fine chemical production are increasingly relying on cell factories developed through metabolic engineering and synthetic biology. The use of high throughput techniques and automation for the design of cell factories, and especially platform strains, has played an important role in the transition from laboratory research to industrial production. Model organisms such as Saccharomyces cerevisiae and Escherichia coli remain widely used host strains for industrial production due to their robust and desirable traits. This review describes some of the bio-based fine chemicals that have reached the market, key metabolic engineering tools that have allowed this to happen and some of the companies that are currently utilizing these technologies for developing industrial production processes. Copyright © 2015 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Surface engineering of one-dimensional tin oxide nanostructures for chemical sensors

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Ma, Yuanyuan; Qu, Yongquan; Zhou, Wei

2013-01-01

Nanostructured materials are promising candidates for chemical sensors due to their fascinating physicochemical properties. Among various candidates, tin oxide (SnO 2 ) has been widely explored in gas sensing elements due to its excellent chemical stability, low cost, ease of fabrication and remarkable reproducibility. We are presenting an overview on recent investigations on 1-dimensional (1D) SnO 2 nanostructures for chemical sensing. In particular, we focus on the performance of devices based on surface engineered SnO 2 nanostructures, and on aspects of morphology, size, and functionality. The synthesis and sensing mechanism of highly selective, sensitive and stable 1D nanostructures for use in chemical sensing are discussed first. This is followed by a discussion of the relationship between the surface properties of the SnO 2 layer and the sensor performance from a thermodynamic point of view. Then, the opportunities and recent progress of chemical sensors fabricated from 1D SnO 2 heterogeneous nanostructures are discussed. Finally, we summarize current challenges in terms of improving the performance of chemical (gas) sensors using such nanostructures and suggest potential applications. (author)

Incorporating Computer-Aided Software in the Undergraduate Chemical Engineering Core Courses

Science.gov (United States)

Alnaizy, Raafat; Abdel-Jabbar, Nabil; Ibrahim, Taleb H.; Husseini, Ghaleb A.

2014-01-01

Introductions of computer-aided software and simulators are implemented during the sophomore-year of the chemical engineering (ChE) curriculum at the American University of Sharjah (AUS). Our faculty concurs that software integration within the curriculum is beneficial to our students, as evidenced by the positive feedback received from industry…

Design and Analysis of Questionnaires for Survey Skills in Chemical Engineering

Science.gov (United States)

Lucas Yagüe, Susana; Coca Sanz, Mónica; González Benito, Gerardo; Cartón López, Ángel; Urueña Alonso, Miguel Ángel; García Cubero, Mª Teresa

2011-01-01

The new reorganization of university education has involved relevant changes in teaching and learning methodologies in order to help students to learn more effectively and to develop important skills and competences demanded by the professional world. In this sense the new configuration of the degree in Chemical Engineering required the…

Metabolic Engineering for Production of Biorenewable Fuels and Chemicals: Contributions of Synthetic Biology

OpenAIRE

Jarboe, Laura R.; Zhang, Xueli; Wang, Xuan; Moore, Jonathan C.; Shanmugam, K. T.; Ingram, Lonnie O.

2010-01-01

Production of fuels and chemicals through microbial fermentation of plant material is a desirable alternative to petrochemical-based production. Fermentative production of biorenewable fuels and chemicals requires the engineering of biocatalysts that can quickly and efficiently convert sugars to target products at a cost that is competitive with existing petrochemical-based processes. It is also important that biocatalysts be robust to extreme fermentation conditions, biomass-derived inhibito...

Application of positron emission tomography to particulate flow measurement in chemical engineering processes

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Bemrose, C.R.; Fowles, P.; Hawkesworth, M.R.; O'Dwyer, M.A.

1988-01-01

Many chemical engineering processes involve the motion of fluids or particulate solids in bulk, and a detailed knowledge of the flow characteristics is important to their efficient and reliable operation. Initial results on the application of PET to fluidized bed studies are reported. Because back-projection image reconstruction strategies are prohibitively inefficient for locating moving single labelled particles, a new technique has been developed based on the closest approach of photon trajectories to give the most probable position. Investigations involving a single particle moving in a known manner have been used to analyse the camera performance and a preliminary relationship between uncertainty and source location is described. To supplement the normal graphical presentation of results, a new animated colour display system has been developed and used to observe for the first time particle motion within a fluidized bed. (orig.)

Diesel Surrogate Fuels for Engine Testing and Chemical-Kinetic Modeling: Compositions and Properties.

Science.gov (United States)

Mueller, Charles J; Cannella, William J; Bays, J Timothy; Bruno, Thomas J; DeFabio, Kathy; Dettman, Heather D; Gieleciak, Rafal M; Huber, Marcia L; Kweon, Chol-Bum; McConnell, Steven S; Pitz, William J; Ratcliff, Matthew A

2016-02-18

The primary objectives of this work were to formulate, blend, and characterize a set of four ultralow-sulfur diesel surrogate fuels in quantities sufficient to enable their study in single-cylinder-engine and combustion-vessel experiments. The surrogate fuels feature increasing levels of compositional accuracy (i.e., increasing exactness in matching hydrocarbon structural characteristics) relative to the single target diesel fuel upon which the surrogate fuels are based. This approach was taken to assist in determining the minimum level of surrogate-fuel compositional accuracy that is required to adequately emulate the performance characteristics of the target fuel under different combustion modes. For each of the four surrogate fuels, an approximately 30 L batch was blended, and a number of the physical and chemical properties were measured. This work documents the surrogate-fuel creation process and the results of the property measurements.

Chemical interaction of tetravalent actinides simulators and the engineering barrier

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Chain, Pablo; Alba, Maria D.; Castro, Miguel A.; Pavon, Esperanza; Mar Orta, M.

2010-01-01

Document available in extended abstract form only. The Deep Geological Repository (DGR) is the most internationally accepted option for the storage of high radioactive wastes. This confinement is based on the Multi-barrier Concept where the engineered barrier is a crucial safety wise. Nowadays, bentonite is accepted as the best argillaceous material in the engineered barrier of DGR. Additionally to its well-known physical role, a chemical interaction between lutetium, as actinide simulator, and the smectite has been demonstrated. The existence of a reaction mechanism, which was not previously described, based on the chemical interaction between the lanthanide cations and the orthosilicate anions of the lamellar structure has been identified. This finding has aroused the interest of the scientific community because lanthanides are used as simulators of high activity radionuclide (HAR) in agreement with the guidelines established in the bibliography. It has been observed that in conditions of moderate temperature and pressure a chemical interaction exists between smectites and rare earth elements (RE) and phases of insoluble di-silicate, RE 2 Si 2 O 7 , which would immobilize RE, are generated. It is remarkable that the reaction extends to all the set of the smectites, although they do not display the same reactivity, the saponite being the most reactive. The main isotopes present in the HLW belong to the actinide elements Np, Pu, Am and Cm, in addition to uranium generated by neutron capture during the fuel combustion process. The study of the mobilization of actinide (IV) thorough the bentonite barrier is limited because of their radioactivity. However, U(IV), Np(IV), Pu(IV) and Th(IV) can be simulated by the stable isotopes of the Zr(IV) and Hf(IV), because they exhibit ionic radius and physicochemical properties very similar to those of the actinide elements. It is the main objective of this research to investigate the chemical interaction of Zr(IV) as actinide

A Planning Approach of Engineering Characteristics Based on QFD-TRIZ Integrated

Science.gov (United States)

Liu, Shang; Shi, Dongyan; Zhang, Ying

Traditional QFD planning method compromises contradictions between engineering characteristics to achieve higher customer satisfaction. However, this compromise trade-off can not eliminate the contradictions existing among the engineering characteristics which limited the overall customer satisfaction. QFD (Quality function deployment) integrated with TRIZ (the Russian acronym of the Theory of Inventive Problem Solving) becomes hot research recently for TRIZ can be used to solve contradictions between engineering characteristics which construct the roof of HOQ (House of quality). But, the traditional QFD planning approach is not suitable for QFD integrated with TRIZ for that TRIZ requires emphasizing the contradictions between engineering characteristics at problem definition stage instead of compromising trade-off. So, a new planning approach based on QFD / TRIZ integration is proposed in this paper, which based on the consideration of the correlation matrix of engineering characteristics and customer satisfaction on the basis of cost. The proposed approach suggests that TRIZ should be applied to solve contradictions at the first step, and the correlation matrix of engineering characteristics should be amended at the second step, and at next step IFR (ideal final result) must be validated, then planning execute. An example is used to illustrate the proposed approach. The application indicated that higher customer satisfaction can be met and the contradictions between the characteristic parameters are eliminated.

Development of Chemical Engineering Course Methods Using Action Research: Case Study

Science.gov (United States)

Virkki-Hatakka, Terhi; Tuunila, Ritva; Nurkka, Niina

2013-01-01

This paper reports on the systematic development of a teaching methodology for two chemical engineering courses. The aim was to improve the quality of teaching to achieve expected learning outcomes more effectively. The development was carried out over a period of several years based on an action research methodology with data systematically…

Engineering Microbial Metabolite Dynamics and Heterogeneity.

Science.gov (United States)

Schmitz, Alexander C; Hartline, Christopher J; Zhang, Fuzhong

2017-10-01

As yields for biological chemical production in microorganisms approach their theoretical maximum, metabolic engineering requires new tools, and approaches for improvements beyond what traditional strategies can achieve. Engineering metabolite dynamics and metabolite heterogeneity is necessary to achieve further improvements in product titers, productivities, and yields. Metabolite dynamics, the ensemble change in metabolite concentration over time, arise from the need for microbes to adapt their metabolism in response to the extracellular environment and are important for controlling growth and productivity in industrial fermentations. Metabolite heterogeneity, the cell-to-cell variation in a metabolite concentration in an isoclonal population, has a significant impact on ensemble productivity. Recent advances in single cell analysis enable a more complete understanding of the processes driving metabolite heterogeneity and reveal metabolic engineering targets. The authors present an overview of the mechanistic origins of metabolite dynamics and heterogeneity, why they are important, their potential effects in chemical production processes, and tools and strategies for engineering metabolite dynamics and heterogeneity. The authors emphasize that the ability to control metabolite dynamics and heterogeneity will bring new avenues of engineering to increase productivity of microbial strains. © 2017 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.

Physics-based approach to chemical source localization using mobile robotic swarms

Science.gov (United States)

Zarzhitsky, Dimitri

2008-07-01

Recently, distributed computation has assumed a dominant role in the fields of artificial intelligence and robotics. To improve system performance, engineers are combining multiple cooperating robots into cohesive collectives called swarms. This thesis illustrates the application of basic principles of physicomimetics, or physics-based design, to swarm robotic systems. Such principles include decentralized control, short-range sensing and low power consumption. We show how the application of these principles to robotic swarms results in highly scalable, robust, and adaptive multi-robot systems. The emergence of these valuable properties can be predicted with the help of well-developed theoretical methods. In this research effort, we have designed and constructed a distributed physicomimetics system for locating sources of airborne chemical plumes. This task, called chemical plume tracing (CPT), is receiving a great deal of attention due to persistent homeland security threats. For this thesis, we have created a novel CPT algorithm called fluxotaxis that is based on theoretical principles of fluid dynamics. Analytically, we show that fluxotaxis combines the essence, as well as the strengths, of the two most popular biologically-inspired CPT methods-- chemotaxis and anemotaxis. The chemotaxis strategy consists of navigating in the direction of the chemical density gradient within the plume, while the anemotaxis approach is based on an upwind traversal of the chemical cloud. Rigorous and extensive experimental evaluations have been performed in simulated chemical plume environments. Using a suite of performance metrics that capture the salient aspects of swarm-specific behavior, we have been able to evaluate and compare the three CPT algorithms. We demonstrate the improved performance of our fluxotaxis approach over both chemotaxis and anemotaxis in these realistic simulation environments, which include obstacles. To test our understanding of CPT on actual hardware

Systems engineering approach towards performance monitoring of emergency diesel generator

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Nurhayati Ramli; Lee, Y.K.

2013-01-01

Full-text: Systems engineering is an interdisciplinary approach and means to enable the realization of successful systems. In this study, systems engineering approach towards the performance monitoring of Emergency Diesel Generator (EDG) is presented. Performance monitoring is part and parcel of predictive maintenance where the systems and components conditions can be detected before they result into failures. In an effort to identify the proposal for addressing performance monitoring, the EDG boundary has been defined. Based on the Probabilistic Safety Analysis (PSA) results and industry operating experiences, the most critical component is identified. This paper proposed a systems engineering concept development framework towards EDG performance monitoring. The expected output of this study is that the EDG reliability can be improved by the performance monitoring alternatives through the systems engineering concept development effort. (author)

An engineering design approach to systems biology.

Science.gov (United States)

Janes, Kevin A; Chandran, Preethi L; Ford, Roseanne M; Lazzara, Matthew J; Papin, Jason A; Peirce, Shayn M; Saucerman, Jeffrey J; Lauffenburger, Douglas A

2017-07-17

Measuring and modeling the integrated behavior of biomolecular-cellular networks is central to systems biology. Over several decades, systems biology has been shaped by quantitative biologists, physicists, mathematicians, and engineers in different ways. However, the basic and applied versions of systems biology are not typically distinguished, which blurs the separate aspirations of the field and its potential for real-world impact. Here, we articulate an engineering approach to systems biology, which applies educational philosophy, engineering design, and predictive models to solve contemporary problems in an age of biomedical Big Data. A concerted effort to train systems bioengineers will provide a versatile workforce capable of tackling the diverse challenges faced by the biotechnological and pharmaceutical sectors in a modern, information-dense economy.

2003 Chemical Engineering Division annual technical report

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Lewis, D.; Graziano, D.; Miller, J. F.; Vandegrift, G.

2004-01-01

The Chemical Engineering Division is one of six divisions within the Engineering Research Directorate at Argonne National Laboratory, one of the U.S. government's oldest and largest research laboratories. The University of Chicago oversees the laboratory on behalf of the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE). Argonne's mission is to conduct basic scientific research, to operate national scientific facilities, to enhance the nation's energy resources, to promote national security, and to develop better ways to manage environmental problems. Argonne has the further responsibility of strengthening the nation's technology base by developing innovative technology and transferring it to industry. The Division is a diverse early-stage engineering organization, specializing in the treatment of spent nuclear fuel, development of advanced electrochemical power sources, and management of both high- and low-level nuclear wastes. Additionally, the Division operates the Analytical Chemistry Laboratory, which provides a broad range of analytical services to Argonne and other organizations. The Division is multidisciplinary. Its people have formal training in chemistry; physics; materials science; and electrical, mechanical, chemical, and nuclear engineering. They are specialists in electrochemistry, ceramics, metallurgy, catalysis, materials characterization, nuclear magnetic resonance, repository science, and the nuclear fuel cycle. Our staff have experience working in and collaborating with university, industry and government research and development laboratories throughout the world. Our wide-ranging expertise finds ready application in solving energy, national security, and environmental problems. Division personnel are frequently called on by governmental and industrial organizations for advice and contributions to problem solving in areas that intersect present and past Division programs and activities. Currently, we are engaged in the development of several technologies of

Simulation of CO and NO emissions in a SI engine using a 0D coherent flame model coupled with a tabulated chemistry approach

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Bougrine, S.; Richard, S.; Michel, J.-B.; Veynante, D.

2014-01-01

Highlights: • A new 0D combustion model (CFM1D-TC) based on a tabulation approach is proposed. • Complex chemistry calculations are used to deduce composition and relaxation times. • NO and CO exponentially relax from a perturbed state to the equilibrium state. • The new model is implemented in an engine simulation software. • Validations are performed by comparison with a wide range of experimental data. - Abstract: Environmental issues stimulate the elaboration of new powertrain systems and fuels for transport as an essential priority to decrease air pollution and green house gases emissions. Developments ranging from architecture definition to engine control and calibration are today increasingly performed using complete vehicle simulators running close to real times. The challenge for engineers is therefore to develop models able to accurately reproduce the engine response without altering the CPU efficiency of the simulator. For this purpose, 0-dimensional models are commonly used to describe combustion processes in engine combustion chambers. This paper extends a 0-dimensional coherent flame model (CFM), called CFM1D, to incorporate chemical effects related to the fuel composition and thermodynamic conditions at low computational costs. Improvements are carried out integrating the NO relaxation approach (NORA) based on a priori homogeneous reactor computations and initially developed for 3D simulations to describe post-oxidation processes in the burnt gases. In this work, this method is extended to the modeling of CO production and oxidation leading to the CORA (CO Relaxation Approach) model. Both NO and CO reaction rates are therefore written as linear relaxations towards their equilibrium mass fraction values Y k eq (where k stands for NO or CO) within a characteristic time τ k . In this approach, Y k eq and τ k are tabulated as functions of equivalence ratio, fresh gases dilution rate by burnt gases, pressure and enthalpy. The resulting new

Production of Fatty Acid-Derived Valuable Chemicals in Synthetic Microbes

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Yu, Ai-Qun; Pratomo Juwono, Nina Kurniasih; Leong, Susanna Su Jan; Chang, Matthew Wook

2014-01-01

Fatty acid derivatives, such as hydroxy fatty acids, fatty alcohols, fatty acid methyl/ethyl esters, and fatty alka(e)nes, have a wide range of industrial applications including plastics, lubricants, and fuels. Currently, these chemicals are obtained mainly through chemical synthesis, which is complex and costly, and their availability from natural biological sources is extremely limited. Metabolic engineering of microorganisms has provided a platform for effective production of these valuable biochemicals. Notably, synthetic biology-based metabolic engineering strategies have been extensively applied to refactor microorganisms for improved biochemical production. Here, we reviewed: (i) the current status of metabolic engineering of microbes that produce fatty acid-derived valuable chemicals, and (ii) the recent progress of synthetic biology approaches that assist metabolic engineering, such as mRNA secondary structure engineering, sensor-regulator system, regulatable expression system, ultrasensitive input/output control system, and computer science-based design of complex gene circuits. Furthermore, key challenges and strategies were discussed. Finally, we concluded that synthetic biology provides useful metabolic engineering strategies for economically viable production of fatty acid-derived valuable chemicals in engineered microbes.

Production of Fatty Acid-Derived Valuable Chemicals in Synthetic Microbes

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Yu, Ai-Qun; Pratomo Juwono, Nina Kurniasih [Department of Biochemistry, Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine, National University of Singapore, Singapore (Singapore); Synthetic Biology Research Program, National University of Singapore, Singapore (Singapore); Leong, Susanna Su Jan [Department of Biochemistry, Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine, National University of Singapore, Singapore (Singapore); Synthetic Biology Research Program, National University of Singapore, Singapore (Singapore); Singapore Institute of Technology, Singapore (Singapore); Chang, Matthew Wook, E-mail: bchcmw@nus.edu.sg [Department of Biochemistry, Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine, National University of Singapore, Singapore (Singapore); Synthetic Biology Research Program, National University of Singapore, Singapore (Singapore)

2014-12-23

Fatty acid derivatives, such as hydroxy fatty acids, fatty alcohols, fatty acid methyl/ethyl esters, and fatty alka(e)nes, have a wide range of industrial applications including plastics, lubricants, and fuels. Currently, these chemicals are obtained mainly through chemical synthesis, which is complex and costly, and their availability from natural biological sources is extremely limited. Metabolic engineering of microorganisms has provided a platform for effective production of these valuable biochemicals. Notably, synthetic biology-based metabolic engineering strategies have been extensively applied to refactor microorganisms for improved biochemical production. Here, we reviewed: (i) the current status of metabolic engineering of microbes that produce fatty acid-derived valuable chemicals, and (ii) the recent progress of synthetic biology approaches that assist metabolic engineering, such as mRNA secondary structure engineering, sensor-regulator system, regulatable expression system, ultrasensitive input/output control system, and computer science-based design of complex gene circuits. Furthermore, key challenges and strategies were discussed. Finally, we concluded that synthetic biology provides useful metabolic engineering strategies for economically viable production of fatty acid-derived valuable chemicals in engineered microbes.

Engineered Barrier System Thermal-Hydraulic-Chemical Column Test Report

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

W.E. Lowry

2001-01-01

The Engineered Barrier System (EBS) Thermal-Hydraulic-Chemical (THC) Column Tests provide data needed for model validation. The EBS Degradation, Flow, and Transport Process Modeling Report (PMR) will be based on supporting models for in-drift THC coupled processes, and the in-drift physical and chemical environment. These models describe the complex chemical interaction of EBS materials, including granular materials, with the thermal and hydrologic conditions that will be present in the repository emplacement drifts. Of particular interest are the coupled processes that result in mineral and salt dissolution/precipitation in the EBS environment. Test data are needed for thermal, hydrologic, and geochemical model validation and to support selection of introduced materials (CRWMS M and O 1999c). These column tests evaluated granular crushed tuff as potential invert ballast or backfill material, under accelerated thermal and hydrologic environments. The objectives of the THC column testing are to: (1) Characterize THC coupled processes that could affect performance of EBS components, particularly the magnitude of permeability reduction (increases or decreases), the nature of minerals produced, and chemical fractionation (i.e., concentrative separation of salts and minerals due to boiling-point elevation). (2) Generate data for validating THC predictive models that will support the EBS Degradation, Flow, and Transport PMR, Rev. 01

An engineering thermodynamic approach to select the electromagnetic wave effective on cell growth.

Science.gov (United States)

Lucia, Umberto; Grisolia, Giulia; Ponzetto, Antonio; Silvagno, Francesca

2017-09-21

To date, the choice of the characteristics of the extremely low-frequency electromagnetic field beneficial in proliferative disorders is still empirical. In order to make the ELF interaction selective, we applied the thermodynamic and biochemical principles to the analysis of the thermo-chemical output generated by the cell in the environment. The theoretical approach applied an engineering bio-thermodynamic approach recently developed in order to obtain a physical-mathematical model that calculated the frequency of the field able to maximize the mean entropy changes as a function of cellular parameters. The combined biochemical approach envisioned the changes of entropy as a metabolic shift leading to a reduction of cell growth. The proliferation of six human cancer cell lines was evaluated as the output signal able to confirm the correctness of the mathematical model. By considering the cell as a reactive system able to respond to the unbalancing external stimuli, for the first time we could calculate and validate the frequencies of the field specifically effective on distinct cells. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Self-Reflection and Professional Competences in the Master Program for Chemical Engineers

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Reijenga, J.C.; Vinken, E.; Gupta-Bhowon, M.; Jhaumeer-Laulloo, S.; Li Kam Wah, H.; Ramasami, P.

2009-01-01

This paper presents an investigation into the quality of self-reflection during industrial intern-ships by Chemical Engineering students at the Eindhoven University of Technology in The Netherlands. The quality of the self-reflection reports written at the end of a compulsory in-dustrial internship

Compilation of contract research for the Chemical Engineering Branch, Division of Engineering Technology. Annual report for FY 1985

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

1986-07-01

This compilation of annual research reports by the contractors to the Chemical Engineering Branch, DET, is published to disseminate information from ongoing programs and covers research conducted during fiscal year 1985. The programs covered in this document include research on: (1) engineered safety feature (ESF) system effectiveness in terms of fission product retention under severe accident conditions; (2) effectiveness and safety aspects of selected decontamination methods; (3) decontamination impacts on solidification and waste disposal; (4) evaluation of nuclear facility decommissioning projects and concepts, and (5) operational schemes to prevent or mitigate the effects of hydrogen combustion during LWR accidents

Engineering system dynamics a unified graph-centered approach

CERN Document Server

Brown, Forbes T

2006-01-01

For today's students, learning to model the dynamics of complex systems is increasingly important across nearly all engineering disciplines. First published in 2001, Forbes T. Brown's Engineering System Dynamics: A Unified Graph-Centered Approach introduced students to a unique and highly successful approach to modeling system dynamics using bond graphs. Updated with nearly one-third new material, this second edition expands this approach to an even broader range of topics. What's New in the Second Edition? In addition to new material, this edition was restructured to build students' competence in traditional linear mathematical methods before they have gone too far into the modeling that still plays a pivotal role. New topics include magnetic circuits and motors including simulation with magnetic hysteresis; extensive new material on the modeling, analysis, and simulation of distributed-parameter systems; kinetic energy in thermodynamic systems; and Lagrangian and Hamiltonian methods. MATLAB(R) figures promi...

A modular approach to creating large engineered cartilage surfaces.

Science.gov (United States)

Ford, Audrey C; Chui, Wan Fung; Zeng, Anne Y; Nandy, Aditya; Liebenberg, Ellen; Carraro, Carlo; Kazakia, Galateia; Alliston, Tamara; O'Connell, Grace D

2018-01-23

Native articular cartilage has limited capacity to repair itself from focal defects or osteoarthritis. Tissue engineering has provided a promising biological treatment strategy that is currently being evaluated in clinical trials. However, current approaches in translating these techniques to developing large engineered tissues remains a significant challenge. In this study, we present a method for developing large-scale engineered cartilage surfaces through modular fabrication. Modular Engineered Tissue Surfaces (METS) uses the well-known, but largely under-utilized self-adhesion properties of de novo tissue to create large scaffolds with nutrient channels. Compressive mechanical properties were evaluated throughout METS specimens, and the tensile mechanical strength of the bonds between attached constructs was evaluated over time. Raman spectroscopy, biochemical assays, and histology were performed to investigate matrix distribution. Results showed that by Day 14, stable connections had formed between the constructs in the METS samples. By Day 21, bonds were robust enough to form a rigid sheet and continued to increase in size and strength over time. Compressive mechanical properties and glycosaminoglycan (GAG) content of METS and individual constructs increased significantly over time. The METS technique builds on established tissue engineering accomplishments of developing constructs with GAG composition and compressive properties approaching native cartilage. This study demonstrated that modular fabrication is a viable technique for creating large-scale engineered cartilage, which can be broadly applied to many tissue engineering applications and construct geometries. Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Analyzing the Function of Cartilage Replacements: A Laboratory Activity to Teach High School Students Chemical and Tissue Engineering Concepts

Science.gov (United States)

Renner, Julie N.; Emady, Heather N.; Galas, Richards J., Jr.; Zhange, Rong; Baertsch, Chelsey D.; Liu, Julie C.

2013-01-01

A cartilage tissue engineering laboratory activity was developed as part of the Exciting Discoveries for Girls in Engineering (EDGE) Summer Camp sponsored by the Women In Engineering Program (WIEP) at Purdue University. Our goal was to increase awareness of chemical engineering and tissue engineering in female high school students through a…

Nonlinear approaches in engineering applications advanced analysis of vehicle related technologies

CERN Document Server

Dai, Liming

2016-01-01

This book looks at the broad field of engineering science through the lens of nonlinear approaches. Examples focus on issues in vehicle technology, including vehicle dynamics, vehicle-road interaction, steering, and control for electric and hybrid vehicles. Also included are discussions on train and tram systems, aerial vehicles, robot-human interaction, and contact and scratch analysis at the micro/nanoscale. Chapters are based on invited contributions from world-class experts in the field who advance the future of engineering by discussing the development of more optimal, accurate, efficient, and cost and energy effective systems. This book is appropriate for researchers, students, and practicing engineers who are interested in the applications of nonlinear approaches to solving engineering and science problems.

Metallurgical engineering and inspection practices in the chemical process industries

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Moller, G.E.

1987-01-01

The process industries, in particular the petroleum refining industry, adopted materials engineering and inspection (ME and I) practices years ago and regularly updated them because they were faced with the handling and refining of flammable, toxic, and corrosive feed stocks. These industries have a number of nonproprietary techniques and procedures, some of which may be applicable in the nuclear power generation field. Some specific inspection and engineering techniques used by the process industries within the framework of the guidelines for inspections and worthy of detailed description include the following: (1) sentry drilling or safety drilling of piping subject to relatively uniform corrosion, such as feedwater heater piping, steam piping, and extraction steam piping; (2) on-stream radiography for thickness measurement and detection of unusual conditions - damaged equipment such as valve blockage; (3) critical analysis of the chemical and refining processes for the relative probability of corrosion; (4) communication of valuable experience within the industry; (5) on-stream ultrasonic thickness testing; and (6) on-stream and off-stream crack and flaw detection. The author, trained in the petroleum refining industry but versed in electric utilities, pulp and paper, chemical process, marine, mining, water handling, waste treatment, and geothermal processes, discusses individual practices of these various industries in the paper

Systems engineering approach to preconceptual design

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

1981-01-01

Steps in the typical pre-conceptual engineering study are: problem identification, identify alternatives, evaluate alternatives, and recommend solution. Three examples of the use of pre-conceptual approach to save money are given; they include the water supply for fire protection in the 200-West Area of Hanford, emergency power for the Purex plant, and new filter for the Purex plant canyon exhaust

Measuring adsorption, diffusion and flow in chemical engineering: applications of magnetic resonance to porous media

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Gladden, Lynn F; Mitchell, Jonathan

2011-01-01

Magnetic resonance (MR) techniques are increasingly used to improve our understanding of the multi-component, multi-phase processes encountered in chemical engineering. This review brings together many of the MR techniques used, and often developed specifically, to study chemical engineering systems and, in particular, processes occurring within porous media. Pulse sequences for relaxometry, pulsed field gradient measurements of diffusion, imaging and velocimetry measurements are described. Recent applications of these MR pulse sequences to microporous, mesoporous and macroporous structures are then reviewed. Considering the microporous and mesoporous systems, we focus attention on studies of rock cores, manufactured materials such as cement and gypsum plaster, and catalysts. When considering macroporous structures, the transport through packed beds of particles typical of fixed-bed catalytic reactors is reviewed; a brief overview of the increasing research interest in gas-solid fluidized beds is also presented. We highlight the field of sparse k-space sampling as an area that is in its infancy and suggest that, combined with Bayesian methods, it will offer new opportunities in both extending the application of high-field MR techniques to chemical engineering and increasing the range of measurements that can be carried out using low-field hardware.

Proceedings of chemical engineering in nuclear technology - national seminar on recent advances in fuel cycle technologies: book of abstracts

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

2014-01-01

Kalpakkam Regional Centre of Indian Institute of Chemical Engineers is embarking on conducting a series of national seminars on Chemical Engineering in Nuclear Technology 2014. For CHEMENT-2014 the theme was Seminar on recent advances in fuel cycle technologies. The topics covered included research and development, modeling and simulation and equipment development. Papers relevant to INIS are indexed separately

On-line services offered by 'Fachinformationszentrum Chemie' to the chemical engineer

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Krietsch, W.

1979-01-01

An introduction to some basic concepts of computerized literature searches is followed by an account of the data stores at 'Fachinformationszentrum Chemie', insofar as they are of interest to chemical engineers. An example of a dialogue search is presented. Some data banks of affiliated organizations and other information centres are then presented. In conclusion current developments and especially EURONET are considered. (orig.) [de

A quick, simplified approach to the evaluation of combustion rate from an internal combustion engine indicator diagram

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Tomić Miroljub V.

2008-01-01

Full Text Available In this paper a simplified procedure of an internal combustion engine in-cylinder pressure record analysis has been presented. The method is very easy for programming and provides quick evaluation of the gas temperature and the rate of combustion. It is based on the consideration proposed by Hohenberg and Killman, but enhances the approach by involving the rate of heat transferred to the walls that was omitted in the original approach. It enables the evaluation of the complete rate of heat released by combustion (often designated as “gross heat release rate” or “fuel chemical energy release rate”, not only the rate of heat transferred to the gas (which is often designated as “net heat release rate”. The accuracy of the method has been also analyzed and it is shown that the errors caused by the simplifications in the model are very small, particularly if the crank angle step is also small. A several practical applications on recorded pressure diagrams taken from both spark ignition and compression ignition engine are presented as well.

NPP site selection: A systems engineering approach

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Pwani, Henry; Kamanja, Florah; Zolkaffly, Zulfakar; Jung, J. C. [KEPCO International Nuclear Graduate School, Ulsan (Korea, Republic of)

2012-10-15

The necessity for improved decision making concerning the siting and licensing of major power facilities has been accelerated in the past decade by the increased environmental consciousness of the public and by the energy crisis. These problems are exceedingly complex due to their multiple objective nature, the many interest groups, the long range time horizons, and the inherent uncertainties of the potential impacts of any decision. Along with the relatively objective economic and engineering concerns, the more subjective factors involving safety, environmental, and social issues are crucial to the problem. The preferences of the general public, as consumers, the utility companies, as builders and operators of power plant facilities, and environmentalists and the government must be accounted for in analyzing power plant siting and licensing issues. We advocate for a systems engineering approach that articulates stake holder's requirements, expert judgements, and a systems decision making approach. The appropriateness and application of systems decision making process is illustrated in this paper.

NPP site selection: A systems engineering approach

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Pwani, Henry; Kamanja, Florah; Zolkaffly, Zulfakar; Jung, J. C.

2012-01-01

The necessity for improved decision making concerning the siting and licensing of major power facilities has been accelerated in the past decade by the increased environmental consciousness of the public and by the energy crisis. These problems are exceedingly complex due to their multiple objective nature, the many interest groups, the long range time horizons, and the inherent uncertainties of the potential impacts of any decision. Along with the relatively objective economic and engineering concerns, the more subjective factors involving safety, environmental, and social issues are crucial to the problem. The preferences of the general public, as consumers, the utility companies, as builders and operators of power plant facilities, and environmentalists and the government must be accounted for in analyzing power plant siting and licensing issues. We advocate for a systems engineering approach that articulates stake holder's requirements, expert judgements, and a systems decision making approach. The appropriateness and application of systems decision making process is illustrated in this paper

The TSCA interagency testing committee`s approaches to screening and scoring chemicals and chemical groups: 1977-1983

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Walker, J.D. [Environmental Protection Agency, Washington, DC (United States)

1990-12-31

This paper describes the TSCA interagency testing committee`s (ITC) approaches to screening and scoring chemicals and chemical groups between 1977 and 1983. During this time the ITC conducted five scoring exercises to select chemicals and chemical groups for detailed review and to determine which of these chemicals and chemical groups should be added to the TSCA Section 4(e) Priority Testing List. 29 refs., 1 fig., 2 tabs.

Perspectives for Cell-homing Approaches to Engineer Dental Pulp.

Science.gov (United States)

Galler, Kerstin M; Widbiller, Matthias

2017-09-01

Sufficient proof is available today to demonstrate that dental pulp tissue engineering is possible. The body of evidence was generated mainly on cell transplantation; however, because of several severe problems afflicted with this approach, it might not be feasible for a clinical setting in the near future. More recently, cell homing has been proposed as a viable alternative. We suggest a modification of the tissue engineering paradigm, where resident cells are attracted by endogenous, dentin-derived growth factors that further induce cell proliferation and differentiation and a bioactive scaffold material laden with these growth factors that serves as a template for tissue formation. This article highlights the latest developments regarding scaffold materials, stem cells, and dentin-derived growth factors specifically for a cell-homing approach to engineer dental pulp and summarizes new ideas. Copyright © 2017 American Association of Endodontists. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Covalent and non-covalent chemical engineering of actin for biotechnological applications.

Science.gov (United States)

Kumar, Saroj; Mansson, Alf

2017-11-15

The cytoskeletal filaments are self-assembled protein polymers with 8-25nm diameters and up to several tens of micrometres length. They have a range of pivotal roles in eukaryotic cells, including transportation of intracellular cargoes (primarily microtubules with dynein and kinesin motors) and cell motility (primarily actin and myosin) where muscle contraction is one example. For two decades, the cytoskeletal filaments and their associated motor systems have been explored for nanotechnological applications including miniaturized sensor systems and lab-on-a-chip devices. Several developments have also revolved around possible exploitation of the filaments alone without their motor partners. Efforts to use the cytoskeletal filaments for applications often require chemical or genetic engineering of the filaments such as specific conjugation with fluorophores, antibodies, oligonucleotides or various macromolecular complexes e.g. nanoparticles. Similar conjugation methods are also instrumental for a range of fundamental biophysical studies. Here we review methods for non-covalent and covalent chemical modifications of actin filaments with focus on critical advantages and challenges of different methods as well as critical steps in the conjugation procedures. We also review potential uses of the engineered actin filaments in nanotechnological applications and in some key fundamental studies of actin and myosin function. Finally, we consider possible future lines of investigation that may be addressed by applying chemical conjugation of actin in new ways. Copyright © 2017 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

[An object-oriented intelligent engineering design approach for lake pollution control].

Science.gov (United States)

Zou, Rui; Zhou, Jing; Liu, Yong; Zhu, Xiang; Zhao, Lei; Yang, Ping-Jian; Guo, Huai-Cheng

2013-03-01

Regarding the shortage and deficiency of traditional lake pollution control engineering techniques, a new lake pollution control engineering approach was proposed in this study, based on object-oriented intelligent design (OOID) from the perspective of intelligence. It can provide a new methodology and framework for effectively controlling lake pollution and improving water quality. The differences between the traditional engineering techniques and the OOID approach were compared. The key points for OOID were described as object perspective, cause and effect foundation, set points into surface, and temporal and spatial optimization. The blue algae control in lake was taken as an example in this study. The effect of algae control and water quality improvement were analyzed in details from the perspective of object-oriented intelligent design based on two engineering techniques (vertical hydrodynamic mixer and pumping algaecide recharge). The modeling results showed that the traditional engineering design paradigm cannot provide scientific and effective guidance for engineering design and decision-making regarding lake pollution. Intelligent design approach is based on the object perspective and quantitative causal analysis in this case. This approach identified that the efficiency of mixers was much higher than pumps in achieving the goal of low to moderate water quality improvement. However, when the objective of water quality exceeded a certain value (such as the control objective of peak Chla concentration exceeded 100 microg x L(-1) in this experimental water), the mixer cannot achieve this goal. The pump technique can achieve the goal but with higher cost. The efficiency of combining the two techniques was higher than using one of the two techniques alone. Moreover, the quantitative scale control of the two engineering techniques has a significant impact on the actual project benefits and costs.

A Story-Telling Approach for a Software Engineering Course Design

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Christensen, Henrik Bærbak

2009-01-01

Advanced programming and software engineering techniques are challenging to learn due to their inherent complexity. However, to the average student they are even more challenging because they have never experienced the context in which the techniques are appropriate. For instance, why learn design...... patterns to increase maintainability when student exercises are never maintained? In this paper, we outline the contextual problems that software engineering teaching has to deal with and present a story telling approach for course design as a remedy. We outline the stories that over the last five years...... have structured lecturing and mandatory exercises for our advanced programming/software engineering course, and present benefits, liabilities, and experiences with the approach comparing it to the normal, topic structured, course design....

A controls engineering approach for analyzing airplane input-output characteristics

Science.gov (United States)

Arbuckle, P. Douglas

1991-01-01

An engineering approach for analyzing airplane control and output characteristics is presented. State-space matrix equations describing the linear perturbation dynamics are transformed from physical coordinates into scaled coordinates. The scaling is accomplished by applying various transformations to the system to employ prior engineering knowledge of the airplane physics. Two different analysis techniques are then explained. Modal analysis techniques calculate the influence of each system input on each fundamental mode of motion and the distribution of each mode among the system outputs. The optimal steady state response technique computes the blending of steady state control inputs that optimize the steady state response of selected system outputs. Analysis of an example airplane model is presented to demonstrate the described engineering approach.

The Chemical Engineer's Toolbox: A Glass Box Approach to Numerical Problem Solving

Science.gov (United States)

Coronell, Daniel G.; Hariri, M. Hossein

2009-01-01

Computer programming in undergraduate engineering education all too often begins and ends with the freshman programming course. Improvements in computer technology and curriculum revision have improved this situation, but often at the expense of the students' learning due to the use of commercial "black box" software. This paper describes the…

Chemical Reactive Anchoring Lipids with Different Performance for Cell Surface Re-engineering Application.

Science.gov (United States)

Vabbilisetty, Pratima; Boron, Mallorie; Nie, Huan; Ozhegov, Evgeny; Sun, Xue-Long

2018-02-28

Introduction of selectively chemical reactive groups at the cell surface enables site-specific cell surface labeling and modification opportunity, thus facilitating the capability to study the cell surface molecular structure and function and the molecular mechanism it underlies. Further, it offers the opportunity to change or improve a cell's functionality for interest of choice. In this study, two chemical reactive anchor lipids, phosphatidylethanolamine-poly(ethylene glycol)-dibenzocyclooctyne (DSPE-PEG 2000 -DBCO) and cholesterol-PEG-dibenzocyclooctyne (CHOL-PEG 2000 -DBCO) were synthesized and their potential application for cell surface re-engineering via lipid fusion were assessed with RAW 264.7 cells as a model cell. Briefly, RAW 264.7 cells were incubated with anchor lipids under various concentrations and at different incubation times. The successful incorporation of the chemical reactive anchor lipids was confirmed by biotinylation via copper-free click chemistry, followed by streptavidin-fluorescein isothiocyanate binding. In comparison, the cholesterol-based anchor lipid afforded a higher cell membrane incorporation efficiency with less internalization than the phospholipid-based anchor lipid. Low cytotoxicity of both anchor lipids upon incorporation into the RAW 264.7 cells was observed. Further, the cell membrane residence time of the cholesterol-based anchor lipid was evaluated with confocal microscopy. This study suggests the potential cell surface re-engineering applications of the chemical reactive anchor lipids.

Chemical Reactive Anchoring Lipids with Different Performance for Cell Surface Re-engineering Application

Science.gov (United States)

2018-01-01

Introduction of selectively chemical reactive groups at the cell surface enables site-specific cell surface labeling and modification opportunity, thus facilitating the capability to study the cell surface molecular structure and function and the molecular mechanism it underlies. Further, it offers the opportunity to change or improve a cell’s functionality for interest of choice. In this study, two chemical reactive anchor lipids, phosphatidylethanolamine–poly(ethylene glycol)–dibenzocyclooctyne (DSPE–PEG2000–DBCO) and cholesterol–PEG–dibenzocyclooctyne (CHOL–PEG2000–DBCO) were synthesized and their potential application for cell surface re-engineering via lipid fusion were assessed with RAW 264.7 cells as a model cell. Briefly, RAW 264.7 cells were incubated with anchor lipids under various concentrations and at different incubation times. The successful incorporation of the chemical reactive anchor lipids was confirmed by biotinylation via copper-free click chemistry, followed by streptavidin-fluorescein isothiocyanate binding. In comparison, the cholesterol-based anchor lipid afforded a higher cell membrane incorporation efficiency with less internalization than the phospholipid-based anchor lipid. Low cytotoxicity of both anchor lipids upon incorporation into the RAW 264.7 cells was observed. Further, the cell membrane residence time of the cholesterol-based anchor lipid was evaluated with confocal microscopy. This study suggests the potential cell surface re-engineering applications of the chemical reactive anchor lipids. PMID:29503972

Prevention of Preharvest Sprouting through Hormone Engineering and Germination Recovery by Chemical Biology.

Science.gov (United States)

Nonogaki, Mariko; Nonogaki, Hiroyuki

2017-01-01

Vivipary, germination of seeds on the maternal plant, is observed in nature and provides ecological advantages in certain wild species, such as mangroves. However, precocious seed germination in agricultural species, such as preharvest sprouting (PHS) in cereals, is a serious issue for food security. PHS reduces grain quality and causes economical losses to farmers. PHS can be prevented by translating the basic knowledge of hormone biology in seeds into technologies. Biosynthesis of abscisic acid (ABA), which is an essential hormone for seed dormancy, can be engineered to enhance dormancy and prevent PHS. Enhancing nine- cis -epoxycarotenoid dioxygenase (NCED), a rate-limiting enzyme of ABA biosynthesis, through a chemically induced gene expression system, has successfully been used to suppress germination of Arabidopsis seeds. The more advanced system NCED positive-feedback system, which amplifies ABA biosynthesis in a seed-specific manner without chemical induction, has also been developed. The proofs of concept established in the model species are now ready to be applied to crops. A potential problem is recovery of germination from hyperdormant crop grains. Hyperdormancy induced by the NCED systems can be reversed by inducing counteracting genes, such as NCED RNA interference or gibberellin (GA) biosynthesis genes. Alternatively, seed sensitivity to ABA can be modified to rescue germination using the knowledge of chemical biology. ABA antagonists, which were developed recently, have great potential to recover germination from the hyperdormant seeds. Combination of the dormancy-imposing and -releasing approaches will establish a comprehensive technology for PHS prevention and germination recovery.

Metabolic engineering of Escherichia coli: a sustainable industrial platform for bio-based chemical production.

Science.gov (United States)

Chen, Xianzhong; Zhou, Li; Tian, Kangming; Kumar, Ashwani; Singh, Suren; Prior, Bernard A; Wang, Zhengxiang

2013-12-01

In order to decrease carbon emissions and negative environmental impacts of various pollutants, more bulk and/or fine chemicals are produced by bioprocesses, replacing the traditional energy and fossil based intensive route. The Gram-negative rod-shaped bacterium, Escherichia coli has been studied extensively on a fundamental and applied level and has become a predominant host microorganism for industrial applications. Furthermore, metabolic engineering of E. coli for the enhanced biochemical production has been significantly promoted by the integrated use of recent developments in systems biology, synthetic biology and evolutionary engineering. In this review, we focus on recent efforts devoted to the use of genetically engineered E. coli as a sustainable platform for the production of industrially important biochemicals such as biofuels, organic acids, amino acids, sugar alcohols and biopolymers. In addition, representative secondary metabolites produced by E. coli will be systematically discussed and the successful strategies for strain improvements will be highlighted. Moreover, this review presents guidelines for future developments in the bio-based chemical production using E. coli as an industrial platform. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Cryo-chemical decellularization of the whole liver for mesenchymal stem cells-based functional hepatic tissue engineering.

Science.gov (United States)

Jiang, Wei-Cheng; Cheng, Yu-Hao; Yen, Meng-Hua; Chang, Yin; Yang, Vincent W; Lee, Oscar K

2014-04-01

Liver transplantation is the ultimate treatment for severe hepatic failure to date. However, the limited supply of donor organs has severely hampered this treatment. So far, great potentials of using mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) to replenish the hepatic cell population have been shown; nevertheless, there still is a lack of an optimal three-dimensional scaffold for generation of well-transplantable hepatic tissues. In this study, we utilized a cryo-chemical decellularization method which combines physical and chemical approach to generate acellular liver scaffolds (ALS) from the whole liver. The produced ALS provides a biomimetic three-dimensional environment to support hepatic differentiation of MSCs, evidenced by expression of hepatic-associated genes and marker protein, glycogen storage, albumin secretion, and urea production. It is also found that hepatic differentiation of MSCs within the ALS is much more efficient than two-dimensional culture in vitro. Importantly, the hepatic-like tissues (HLT) generated by repopulating ALS with MSCs are able to act as functional grafts and rescue lethal hepatic failure after transplantation in vivo. In summary, the cryo-chemical method used in this study is suitable for decellularization of liver and create acellular scaffolds that can support hepatic differentiation of MSCs and be used to fabricate functional tissue-engineered liver constructs. Copyright © 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

A probabilistic approach for validating protein NMR chemical shift assignments

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Wang Bowei; Wang, Yunjun; Wishart, David S.

2010-01-01

It has been estimated that more than 20% of the proteins in the BMRB are improperly referenced and that about 1% of all chemical shift assignments are mis-assigned. These statistics also reflect the likelihood that any newly assigned protein will have shift assignment or shift referencing errors. The relatively high frequency of these errors continues to be a concern for the biomolecular NMR community. While several programs do exist to detect and/or correct chemical shift mis-referencing or chemical shift mis-assignments, most can only do one, or the other. The one program (SHIFTCOR) that is capable of handling both chemical shift mis-referencing and mis-assignments, requires the 3D structure coordinates of the target protein. Given that chemical shift mis-assignments and chemical shift re-referencing issues should ideally be addressed prior to 3D structure determination, there is a clear need to develop a structure-independent approach. Here, we present a new structure-independent protocol, which is based on using residue-specific and secondary structure-specific chemical shift distributions calculated over small (3-6 residue) fragments to identify mis-assigned resonances. The method is also able to identify and re-reference mis-referenced chemical shift assignments. Comparisons against existing re-referencing or mis-assignment detection programs show that the method is as good or superior to existing approaches. The protocol described here has been implemented into a freely available Java program called 'Probabilistic Approach for protein Nmr Assignment Validation (PANAV)' and as a web server (http://redpoll.pharmacy.ualberta.ca/PANAVhttp://redpoll.pharmacy.ualberta.ca/PANAV) which can be used to validate and/or correct as well as re-reference assigned protein chemical shifts.

An engineering approach to extending lifespan in C. elegans.

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Dror Sagi

Full Text Available We have taken an engineering approach to extending the lifespan of Caenorhabditis elegans. Aging stands out as a complex trait, because events that occur in old animals are not under strong natural selection. As a result, lifespan can be lengthened rationally using bioengineering to modulate gene expression or to add exogenous components. Here, we engineered longer lifespan by expressing genes from zebrafish encoding molecular functions not normally present in worms. Additionally, we extended lifespan by increasing the activity of four endogenous worm aging pathways. Next, we used a modular approach to extend lifespan by combining components. Finally, we used cell- and worm-based assays to analyze changes in cell physiology and as a rapid means to evaluate whether multi-component transgenic lines were likely to have extended longevity. Using engineering to add novel functions and to tune endogenous functions provides a new framework for lifespan extension that goes beyond the constraints of the worm genome.

Interactive design of generic chemical patterns.

Science.gov (United States)

Schomburg, Karen T; Wetzer, Lars; Rarey, Matthias

2013-07-01

Every medicinal chemist has to create chemical patterns occasionally for querying databases, applying filters or describing functional groups. However, the representations of chemical patterns have been so far limited to languages with highly complex syntax, handicapping the application of patterns. Graphic pattern editors similar to chemical editors can facilitate the work with patterns. In this article, we review the interfaces of frequently used web search engines for chemical patterns. We take a look at pattern editing concepts of standalone chemical editors and finally present a completely new, unpublished graphical approach to pattern design, the SMARTSeditor. Copyright © 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

A Comprehensive Approach for Pectin Chemical and Functional Characterization

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

de Sousa, António Felipe Gomes Teixeira

In this work, a comprehensive approach for the chemical and functional analysis of pectin was used in order to relate the different extraction conditions used to the polymer structure and the final functional (mainly gelling) properties. A wide range of methods were utilized including chemical an...

Alternative approaches to providing engineering expertise on shift

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Olson, J.; Schreiber, R.E.; Melber, B.D.

1984-05-01

This report represents the conclusions of a project studying the role of engineering expertise on shift in nuclear power plants. Using the present shift technical advisor (STA) position as the base case, several alternatives are analyzed. On-shift alternatives included the STA, the SS (shift supervisor), and the SE (shift engineer). The SE is degreed, experienced, trained, and licensed as a Senior Reactor Operator. Some non-shift alternatives were also studied. These included a cadre of on-call engineers and specialists within continual contact and easy reach of the plant; a technical system of phone and data lines linking the plant with a facility similar to an on-site technical support center; and finally, an SPDS (safety parameter display system) to agument technical upgrading of operator aids presently available. Potential problems considered in the analysis of implementation of these alternatives included job content constraints, problems of crew acceptance, and problems of labor supply and retention. Of the considered alternatives, the SE and SS options appear superior to the current STA approach. The SE approach appears the easiest to implement and the most effective under varied plant conditions. The SE may also serve as liaison to off-site support facilities

A Multi-Institution Study of Student Demographics and Outcomes in Chemical Engineering

Science.gov (United States)

Lord, Susan M.; Layton, Richard A.; Ohland, Matthew W.; Brawner, Catherine E.; Long, Russell A.

2014-01-01

Using a large multi-institutional dataset, we describe demographics and outcomes for students starting in and transferring into chemical engineering (ChE). In this dataset, men outnumber women in ChE except among black students. While ChE starters graduate in ChE at rates comparable to or above their racial/ethnic population average for…

Selective catalytic oxidation of hydrocarbons as a challenge to the chemical engineer

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Emig, G [Erlangen-Nuernberg Univ., Erlangen (Germany, F.R.). Inst. fuer Technische Chemie 1

1977-11-01

In the conversion of the most important chemical raw materials, natural oil and natural gas, to intermediate or end products, selective catalytic oxidation plays an increasing role. This method makes it possible in many cases to use more economical, single-step processes instead of the older multi-step processes. Using the typical example of propylene oxidation or ammonoxidation, the problems encountered by chemical engineers in the development of a heterogeneous-catalytic method of oxidation are demonstrated. The importance of systematic catalyst development is stressed. General aspects of the development of novel processes or the improvement of existing catalytic processes are discussed.

Engineering Ligninolytic Consortium for Bioconversion of Lignocelluloses to Ethanol and Chemicals.

Science.gov (United States)

Bilal, Muhammad; Nawaz, Muhammad Zohaib; Iqbal, Hafiz M N; Hou, Jialin; Mahboob, Shahid; Al-Ghanim, Khalid A; Cheng, Hairong

2018-01-01

Rising environmental concerns and recent global scenario of cleaner production and consumption are leading to the design of green industrial processes to produce alternative fuels and chemicals. Although bioethanol is one of the most promising and eco-friendly alternatives to fossil fuels yet its production from food and feed has received much negative criticism. The main objective of this study was to present the noteworthy potentialities of lignocellulosic biomass as an enormous and renewable biological resource. The particular focus was also given on engineering ligninolytic consortium for bioconversion of lignocelluloses to ethanol and chemicals on sustainable and environmentally basis. Herein, an effort has been made to extensively review, analyze and compile salient information related to the topic of interest. Several authentic bibliographic databases including PubMed, Scopus, Elsevier, Springer, Bentham Science and other scientific databases were searched with utmost care, and inclusion/ exclusion criterion was adopted to appraise the quality of retrieved peer-reviewed research literature. Bioethanol production from lignocellulosic biomass can largely satisfy the possible inconsistency of first-generation ethanol since it utilizes inedible lignocellulosic feedstocks, primarily sourced from agriculture and forestry wastes. Two major polysaccharides in lignocellulosic biomass namely, cellulose and hemicellulose constitute a complex lignocellulosic network by connecting with lignin, which is highly recalcitrant to depolymerization. Several attempts have been made to reduce the cost involved in the process through improving the pretreatment process. While, the ligninolytic enzymes of white rot fungi (WRF) including laccase, lignin peroxidase (LiP), and manganese peroxidase (MnP) have appeared as versatile biocatalysts for delignification of several lignocellulosic residues. The first part of the review is mainly focused on engineering ligninolytic consortium

Systems engineering: A formal approach. Part 1: System concepts

Science.gov (United States)

Vanhee, K. M.

1993-03-01

Engineering is the scientific discipline focused on the creation of new artifacts that are supposed to be of some use to our society. Different types of artifacts require different engineering approaches. However, in all these disciplines the development of a new artifact is divided into stages. Three stages can always be recognized: Analysis, Design, and Realization. The book considers only the first two stages of the development process. It focuses on a specific type of artifacts, called discrete dynamic systems. These systems consist of active components of actors that consume and produce passive components or tokens. Three subtypes are studied in more detail: business systems (like a factory or restaurant), information systems (whether automated or not), and automated systems (systems that are controlled by an automated information system). The first subtype is studied by industrial engineers, the last by software engineers and electrical engineers, whereas the second is a battlefield for all three disciplines. The union of these disciplines is called systems engineering.

Chemical and biological sensors based on defect-engineered graphene mesh field-effect transistors.

Science.gov (United States)

Cho, Seunghee H; Kwon, Sun Sang; Yi, Jaeseok; Park, Won Il

2016-01-01

Graphene has been intensively studied for applications to high-performance sensors, but the sensing characteristics of graphene devices have varied from case to case, and the sensing mechanism has not been satisfactorily determined thus far. In this review, we describe recent progress in engineering of the defects in graphene grown by a silica-assisted chemical vapor deposition technique and elucidate the effect of the defects upon the electrical response of graphene sensors. This review provides guidelines for engineering and/or passivating defects to improve sensor performance and reliability.

Coagulation sensors based on magnetostrictive delay lines for biomedical and chemical engineering applications

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Maliaritsi, E.; Zoumpoulakis, L.; Simitzis, J.; Vassiliou, P.; Hristoforou, E.

2006-01-01

Coagulation sensors based on the magnetostrictive delay line technique are presented in this paper. They are based on magnetostrictive ribbons and are used for measuring the coagulation, curing or solidification time of different liquids. Experimental results indicate that the presented sensing elements can determine the blood coagulation with remarkable repeatability, thus allowing their use as blood coagulation sensors. Additionally, results indicate that they can also measure curing time of resins, solidification of fluids and coagulation of chemical substances, therefore allowing their implementation in chemical engineering applications

Strategies for the chemical and biological functionalization of scaffolds for cardiac tissue engineering: a review.

Science.gov (United States)

Tallawi, Marwa; Rosellini, Elisabetta; Barbani, Niccoletta; Cascone, Maria Grazia; Rai, Ranjana; Saint-Pierre, Guillaume; Boccaccini, Aldo R

2015-07-06

The development of biomaterials for cardiac tissue engineering (CTE) is challenging, primarily owing to the requirement of achieving a surface with favourable characteristics that enhances cell attachment and maturation. The biomaterial surface plays a crucial role as it forms the interface between the scaffold (or cardiac patch) and the cells. In the field of CTE, synthetic polymers (polyglycerol sebacate, polyethylene glycol, polyglycolic acid, poly-l-lactide, polyvinyl alcohol, polycaprolactone, polyurethanes and poly(N-isopropylacrylamide)) have been proven to exhibit suitable biodegradable and mechanical properties. Despite the fact that they show the required biocompatible behaviour, most synthetic polymers exhibit poor cell attachment capability. These synthetic polymers are mostly hydrophobic and lack cell recognition sites, limiting their application. Therefore, biofunctionalization of these biomaterials to enhance cell attachment and cell material interaction is being widely investigated. There are numerous approaches for functionalizing a material, which can be classified as mechanical, physical, chemical and biological. In this review, recent studies reported in the literature to functionalize scaffolds in the context of CTE, are discussed. Surface, morphological, chemical and biological modifications are introduced and the results of novel promising strategies and techniques are discussed.

On a New Approach to Education about Ethics for Engineers at Meijou University

Science.gov (United States)

Fukaya, Minoru; Morimoto, Tsukasa; Kimura, Noritsugu

We propose a new approach to education of so called “engineering ethics”. This approach has two important elements in its teaching system. One is “problem-solving learning”, and the other is “discussion ability”. So far, engineering ethics started at the ethical standpoint. But we put the viewpoint of problem-solving learning at the educational base of engineering ethics. Because many problems have complicated structures, so if we want to solve them, we should discuss each other. Problem-solving ability and discussion ability, they help engineers to solve the complex problems in their social everyday life. Therefore, Meijo University names engineering ethics “ethics for engineers”. At Meijou University about 1300 students take classes in both ethics for engineers and environmental ethics for one year.

Development and Application of 3D Printed Mesoreactors in Chemical Engineering Education

Science.gov (United States)

Tabassum, Tahseen; Iloska, Marija; Scuereb, Daniel; Taira, Noriko; Jin, Chongguang; Zaitsev, Vladimir; Afshar, Fara; Kim, Taejin

2018-01-01

3D printing technology has an enormous potential to apply to chemical engineering education. In this paper, we describe several designs of 3D printed mesoreactors (Y-shape, T-shape, and Long channel shape) using the following steps: reactor sketching, CAD modeling, and reactor printing. With a focus on continuous plug flow mesoreactors (PFRs, i.d.…

Sequence-engineered mRNA Without Chemical Nucleoside Modifications Enables an Effective Protein Therapy in Large Animals

Science.gov (United States)

Thess, Andreas; Grund, Stefanie; Mui, Barbara L; Hope, Michael J; Baumhof, Patrick; Fotin-Mleczek, Mariola; Schlake, Thomas

2015-01-01

Being a transient carrier of genetic information, mRNA could be a versatile, flexible, and safe means for protein therapies. While recent findings highlight the enormous therapeutic potential of mRNA, evidence that mRNA-based protein therapies are feasible beyond small animals such as mice is still lacking. Previous studies imply that mRNA therapeutics require chemical nucleoside modifications to obtain sufficient protein expression and avoid activation of the innate immune system. Here we show that chemically unmodified mRNA can achieve those goals as well by applying sequence-engineered molecules. Using erythropoietin (EPO) driven production of red blood cells as the biological model, engineered Epo mRNA elicited meaningful physiological responses from mice to nonhuman primates. Even in pigs of about 20 kg in weight, a single adequate dose of engineered mRNA encapsulated in lipid nanoparticles (LNPs) induced high systemic Epo levels and strong physiological effects. Our results demonstrate that sequence-engineered mRNA has the potential to revolutionize human protein therapies. PMID:26050989

Role of knowledge based engineering in Heavy Water Plants and its relevance to chemical industry

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Sonde, R.R.

2002-01-01

The development of heavy water technology under the Department of Atomic Energy in India is carried out based on a mission oriented programme and this was backed up by a committed and highly trained manpower with a single minded pursuit to achieve the goal of making India self-sufficient in this challenging area. The paper gives step by step methodology followed in completion of the above mission which has become a benchmark in the chemical industry. A large sized chemical industry (Heavy Water plant being once such industry) has many features which are similar. The process design typically includes design of reactors, distillation columns, heat exchange networks, fluid transfer machinery, support utility systems etc. Besides, there are other issues like safety engineering, selection of materials, commissioning strategies and operating philosophies which are quite common to almost all chemical industries. Heavy water board has engineered and set up large scale heavy water plants and the technology for production of heavy water is completely assimilated in India and this paper tries to bring about some of the strategies which were instrumental in achieving this. The story of success in this technology can most certainly be followed in development of any other process technology. The important factors in the development of this technology is based on integration of R and D, process design, engineering backup, safety features, role of good construction and project management and good operating practices. One more important fact in this technology development is continuous improvement in operation and use of knowledge based engineering for debottlenecking. (author)

Approaches to Improve Mixing in Compression Ignition Engines

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Boot, M.D.

2010-04-20

This thesis presents three approaches to suppress soot emissions in compression ignition (CI) engines. First, a fuel chemistry approach is proposed. A particular class of fuels - cyclic oxygenates - is identified which is capable of significantly reducing engine-out soot emissions. By means of experiments in 'closed' and optical engines, as well as on an industrial burner, two possible mechanisms are identified that could account for the observed reduction in soot: a) an extended ignition delay (ID) and b) a longer flame lift-length (FLoL). Further analysis of the available data suggests that both mechanisms are related to the inherently low reactivity of the fuel class in question. These findings are largely in line with data found in literature. In the second approach, it is attempted to reduce soot by adopting an alternative combustion concept: early direct injection premixed charge compression ignition (EDI PCCI). In this concept, fuel is injected relatively early in the compression stroke instead of conventional, close to top-dead-center (TDC), injection schemes. While the goal of soot reduction can indeed be achieved via this approach, an important drawback must be addressed before this concept can be considered practically viable. Due to the fact that combustion chamber temperature and pressure is relatively low early in the compression stroke, fuel impingement against the cylinder liner (wall-wetting) often occurs. Consequently, high levels of unburned hydrocarbons (UHC), oil dilution and poor efficiency are observed. Several strategies, combining a limited engine modification with dedicated air management and fueling settings, are investigated to tackle this drawback. All of these strategies, and especially their combination, resulted in significantly lower UHC emissions and improved fuel economy. Although UHC emissions are typically a tell-tale sign of wall-wetting, as mentioned earlier, the relation between these two has long been hypothetical

A new approach to heart valve tissue engineering

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Kaasi, Andreas; Cestari, Idágene A.; Stolf, Noedir A G.

2011-01-01

The 'biomimetic' approach to tissue engineering usually involves the use of a bioreactor mimicking physiological parameters whilst supplying nutrients to the developing tissue. Here we present a new heart valve bioreactor, having as its centrepiece a ventricular assist device (VAD), which exposes...... chamber. Subsequently, applied vacuum to the pneumatic chamber causes the blood chamber to fill. A mechanical heart valve was placed in the VAD's inflow position. The tissue engineered (TE) valve was placed in the outflow position. The VAD was coupled in series with a Windkessel compliance chamber...

NIF: Impacts of chemical accidents and comparison of chemical/radiological accident approaches

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Lazaro, M.A.; Policastro, A.J.; Rhodes, M.

1996-01-01

The US Department of Energy (DOE) proposes to construct and operate the National Ignition Facility (NIF). The goals of the NIF are to (1) achieve fusion ignition in the laboratory for the first time by using inertial confinement fusion (ICF) technology based on an advanced-design neodymium glass solid-state laser, and (2) conduct high-energy-density experiments in support of national security and civilian applications. The primary focus of this paper is worker-public health and safety issues associated with postulated chemical accidents during the operation of NIF. The key findings from the accident analysis will be presented. Although NIF chemical accidents will be emphasized, the important differences between chemical and radiological accident analysis approaches and the metrics for reporting results will be highlighted. These differences are common EIS facility and transportation accident assessments

Engineering systems reliability, safety, and maintenance an integrated approach

CERN Document Server

Dhillon, B S

2017-01-01

Today, engineering systems are an important element of the world economy and each year billions of dollars are spent to develop, manufacture, operate, and maintain various types of engineering systems around the globe. Many of these systems are highly sophisticated and contain millions of parts. For example, a Boeing jumbo 747 is made up of approximately 4.5 million parts including fasteners. Needless to say, reliability, safety, and maintenance of systems such as this have become more important than ever before.　 Global competition and other factors are forcing manufacturers to produce highly reliable, safe, and maintainable engineering products. Therefore, there is a definite need for the reliability, safety, and maintenance professionals to work closely during design and other phases. Engineering Systems Reliability, Safety, and Maintenance: An Integrated Approach eliminates the need to consult many different and diverse sources in the hunt for the information required to design better engineering syste...

Proceedings of the sixty-sixth annual session of Indian Institute of Chemical Engineers and joint Indo-North American symposium: oral and poster abstracts

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

2013-01-01

The aim of the symposium was to to discuss the current trends and future developments in the field of chemical engineering technology. The main themes of the symposium were: Advanced Separation Techniques; Biochemical Engineering; Process Intensification; Fossil Fuel, Nuclear and Alternate Energy; Novel Reactors and operating strategies; Green Chemistry and Engineering; Food Security; Water Treatment, Reuse and Recycle; Healthcare Technology; Nanomaterials; Process Development; Process Engineering and Control; Borderless Chemical Engineering; Fluid Mechanics and CFD; Intellectual Property Rights; Sustainable Development etc. Papers relevant to INIS are indexed separately

Systems engineering approach for future automotive microcontroller solutions; Systems-Engineering-Ansatz zur Entwicklung zukuenftiger Mikrocontroller

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Hilgert, J.; Turski, K.; Vollhardt, S. [NEC Electronics Europe, Duesseldorf (Germany)

2005-09-01

In the future, microcontrollers used in automotive applications will have to meet escalating demands from different areas. For this reason, NEC Electronics (Europe) regards the concept of Systems Engineering as the key to handling the development of the complex system vehicle. This article describes how the Systems Engineering approach is applied to the development of new microcontrollers. The example used is the development platform for NEC's upcoming gateway product. (orig.)

Coupling chemical and biological catalysis: a flexible paradigm for producing biobased chemicals.

Science.gov (United States)

Schwartz, Thomas J; Shanks, Brent H; Dumesic, James A

2016-04-01

Advances in metabolic engineering have allowed for the development of new biological catalysts capable of selectively de-functionalizing biomass to yield platform molecules that can be upgraded to biobased chemicals using high efficiency continuous processing allowed by heterogeneous chemical catalysis. Coupling these disciplines overcomes the difficulties of selectively activating COH bonds by heterogeneous chemical catalysis and producing petroleum analogues by biological catalysis. We show that carboxylic acids, pyrones, and alcohols are highly flexible platforms that can be used to produce biobased chemicals by this approach. More generally, we suggest that molecules with three distinct functionalities may represent a practical upper limit on the extent of functionality present in the platform molecules that serve as the bridge between biological and chemical catalysis. Copyright © 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Engineering-derived approaches for iPSC preparation, expansion, differentiation and applications.

Science.gov (United States)

Li, Yang; Li, Ling; Chen, Zhi-Nan; Gao, Ge; Yao, Rui; Sun, Wei

2017-07-31

Remarkable achievements have been made since induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) were first introduced in 2006. Compared with non-pluripotent stem cells, iPSC research faces several additional complexities, such as the choice of extracellular matrix proteins, growth and differentiation factors, as well as technical challenges related to self-renewal and directed differentiation. Overcoming these challenges requires the integration of knowledge and technologies from multiple fields including cell biology, biomaterial science, engineering, physics and medicine. Here, engineering-derived iPSC approaches are reviewed according to three aspects of iPSC studies: preparation, expansion, differentiation and applications. Engineering strategies, such as 3D systems establishment, cell-matrix mechanics and the regulation of biophysical and biochemical cues, together with engineering techniques, such as 3D scaffolds, cell microspheres and bioreactors, have been applied to iPSC studies and have generated insightful results and even mini-organs such as retinas, livers and intestines. Specific results are given to demonstrate how these approaches impact iPSC behavior, and related mechanisms are discussed. In addition, cell printing technologies are presented as an advanced engineering-derived approach since they have been applied in both iPSC studies and the construction of diverse tissues and organs. Further development and possible innovations of cell printing technologies are presented in terms of creating complex and functional iPSC-derived living tissues and organs.

Combining technologies to create bioactive hybrid scaffolds for bone tissue engineering

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Nandakumar, A.; Barradas, A.M.C.; de Boer, Jan; Moroni, Lorenzo; van Blitterswijk, Clemens; Habibovic, Pamela

2013-01-01

Combining technologies to engineer scaffolds that can offer physical and chemical cues to cells is an attractive approach in tissue engineering and regenerative medicine. In this study, we have fabricated polymer-ceramic hybrid scaffolds for bone regeneration by combining rapid prototyping (RP),

Graphene: chemical approaches to the synthesis and modification

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Grayfer, E D; Makotchenko, V G; Nazarov, Albert S; Kim, S J; Fedorov, Vladimir E

2011-08-31

Published data on the new carbon nanomaterial, graphene, are described systematically from the chemist's standpoint. The attention is focused on the chemical methods of the synthesis of graphene-like materials from various precursors: natural and expanded graphite, graphite oxide, graphite intercalation compounds, etc. Approaches to the chemical modification of the graphene plane by various reagents and routes for the preparation of colloidal dispersions of graphene are considered. The bibliography includes 220 references.

Lessons Learned on University Education Programs of Chemical Engineering Principles for Nuclear Plant Operations - 13588

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Ryu, Jun-hyung

2013-01-01

University education aims to supply qualified human resources for industries. In complex large scale engineering systems such as nuclear power plants, the importance of qualified human resources cannot be underestimated. The corresponding education program should involve many topics systematically. Recently a nuclear engineering program has been initiated in Dongguk University, South Korea. The current education program focuses on undergraduate level nuclear engineering students. Our main objective is to provide industries fresh engineers with the understanding on the interconnection of local parts and the entire systems of nuclear power plants and the associated systems. From the experience there is a huge opportunity for chemical engineering disciple in the context of giving macroscopic overview on nuclear power plant and waste treatment management by strengthening the analyzing capability of fundamental situations. (authors)

A Hybrid approach for aeroacoustic analysis of the engine exhaust system

OpenAIRE

Sathyanarayana, Y; Munjal, ML

2000-01-01

This paper presents a new hybrid approach for prediction of noise radiation from engine exhaust systems. It couples the time domain analysis of the engine and the frequency domain analysis of the muffler, and has the advantages of both. In this approach, cylinder/cavity is analyzed in the time domain to calculate the exhaust mass flux history at the exhaust valve by means of the method of characteristics, avoiding the tedious procedure of interpolation at every mesh point and solving a number...

Chemical engineering in fuel reprocessing. The French experience

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Viala, M.; Sombret, C.; Bernard, C.; Miquel, P.; Moulin, J.P.

1992-01-01

Reprocessing is the back-end of the nuclear fuel cycle, designed to recover valuable fissile materials, especially plutonium, and to condition safely all the wastes ready for disposal. For its new commercial reprocessing plants (UP 3 and UP 2 800) COGEMA decided to include many engineering innovations as well as new processes and key-components developed by CEA. UP 3 is a complete new plant with a capacity of 800 t/y which was put in operation in August 1990. UP 2 800 is an extension of the existing UP 2 facility, designed to achieve the same annual capacity of 800 t/y, to be put in operation at the end of 1993 by the commissioning of a new head-end and highly active chemical process facilities

An approach for assessing human exposures to chemical mixtures in the environment

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Rice, Glenn; MacDonell, Margaret; Hertzberg, Richard C.; Teuschler, Linda; Picel, Kurt; Butler, Jim; Chang, Young-Soo; Hartmann, Heidi

2008-01-01

Humans are exposed daily to multiple chemicals, including incidental exposures to complex chemical mixtures released into the environment and to combinations of chemicals that already co-exist in the environment because of previous releases from various sources. Exposures to chemical mixtures can occur through multiple pathways and across multiple routes. In this paper, we propose an iterative approach for assessing exposures to environmental chemical mixtures; it is similar to single-chemical approaches. Our approach encompasses two elements of the Risk Assessment Paradigm: Problem Formulation and Exposure Assessment. Multiple phases of the assessment occur in each element of the paradigm. During Problem Formulation, analysts identify and characterize the source(s) of the chemical mixture, ensure that dose-response and exposure assessment measures are concordant, and develop a preliminary evaluation of the mixture's fate. During Exposure Assessment, analysts evaluate the fate of the chemicals comprising the mixture using appropriate models and measurement data, characterize the exposure scenario, and estimate human exposure to the mixture. We also describe the utility of grouping the chemicals to be analyzed based on both physical-chemical properties and an understanding of environmental fate. In the article, we also highlight the need for understanding of changes in the mixture composition in the environment due to differential transport, differential degradation, and differential partitioning to other media. The section describes the application of the method to various chemical mixtures, highlighting issues associated with assessing exposures to chemical mixtures in the environment

Computational design of auxotrophy-dependent microbial biosensors for combinatorial metabolic engineering experiments.

Science.gov (United States)

Tepper, Naama; Shlomi, Tomer

2011-01-21

Combinatorial approaches in metabolic engineering work by generating genetic diversity in a microbial population followed by screening for strains with improved phenotypes. One of the most common goals in this field is the generation of a high rate chemical producing strain. A major hurdle with this approach is that many chemicals do not have easy to recognize attributes, making their screening expensive and time consuming. To address this problem, it was previously suggested to use microbial biosensors to facilitate the detection and quantification of chemicals of interest. Here, we present novel computational methods to: (i) rationally design microbial biosensors for chemicals of interest based on substrate auxotrophy that would enable their high-throughput screening; (ii) predict engineering strategies for coupling the synthesis of a chemical of interest with the production of a proxy metabolite for which high-throughput screening is possible via a designed bio-sensor. The biosensor design method is validated based on known genetic modifications in an array of E. coli strains auxotrophic to various amino-acids. Predicted chemical production rates achievable via the biosensor-based approach are shown to potentially improve upon those predicted by current rational strain design approaches. (A Matlab implementation of the biosensor design method is available via http://www.cs.technion.ac.il/~tomersh/tools).

Class and Home Problems: Humidification, a True "Home" Problem for p. Chemical Engineer

Science.gov (United States)

Condoret, Jean-Stephane

2012-01-01

The problem of maintaining hygrothermal comfort in a house is addressed using the chemical engineer's toolbox. A simple dynamic modelling proved to give a good description of the humidification of the house in winter, using a domestic humidifier. Parameters of the model were identified from a simple experiment. Surprising results, especially…

The engineering approach to winter sports

CERN Document Server

Cheli, Federico; Maldifassi, Stefano; Melzi, Stefano; Sabbioni, Edoardo

2016-01-01

The Engineering Approach to Winter Sports presents the state-of-the-art research in the field of winter sports in a harmonized and comprehensive way for a diverse audience of engineers, equipment and facilities designers, and materials scientists. The book examines the physics and chemistry of snow and ice with particular focus on the interaction (friction) between sports equipment and snow/ice, how it is influenced by environmental factors, such as temperature and pressure, as well as by contaminants and how it can be modified through the use of ski waxes or the microtextures of blades or ski soles. The authors also cover, in turn, the different disciplines in winter sports:  skiing (both alpine and cross country), skating and jumping, bob sledding and skeleton, hockey and curling, with attention given to both equipment design and on the simulation of gesture and  track optimization.

A POGIL approach to teaching engineering hydrology

Science.gov (United States)

Rutten, M.

2012-12-01

This paper presents a case study of the author's experience using Problem Guided Inquiry Learning (POGIL) in an engineering hydrology course. This course is part of an interdisciplinary Water Management program at Bachelor level in the Netherlands. The aims of this approach were to promote constructivism of knowledge, activate critical thinking and reduce math anxiety. POGIL was developed for chemistry education in the United States. To the authors knowledge this is the first application of this approach in Europe. A first trial was done in 2010-2011 and a second trial in 2011-2012 and 55 students participated. The problems that motivated the novel approach, general information on POGIL, its implementation in the course are discussed and the results so far are evaluated.

Model Reduction in Chemical Engineering : Case studies applied to process analysis, design and operation

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Dorneanu, B.

2011-01-01

During the last decades, models have become widely used for supporting a broad range of chemical engineering activities, such as product and process design and development, process monitoring and control, real time optimization of plant operation or supply chain management. Although tremendous

Holographic black hole engineering at finite baryon chemical potential

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Rougemont, Romulo

2017-01-01

This is a contribution for the Proceedings of the Conference Hot Quarks 2016, held at South Padre Island, Texas, USA, 12-17 September 2016. I briefly review some thermodynamic and baryon transport results obtained from a bottom-up Einstein-Maxwell-Dilaton holographic model engineered to describe the physics of the quark-gluon plasma at finite temperature and baryon density. The results for the equation of state, baryon susceptibilities, and the curvature of the crossover band are in quantitative agreement with the corresponding lattice QCD results with 2 + 1 flavors and physical quark masses. Baryon diffusion is predicted to be suppressed by increasing the baryon chemical potential. (paper)

The JPL Cost Risk Analysis Approach that Incorporates Engineering Realism

Science.gov (United States)

Harmon, Corey C.; Warfield, Keith R.; Rosenberg, Leigh S.

2006-01-01

This paper discusses the JPL Cost Engineering Group (CEG) cost risk analysis approach that accounts for all three types of cost risk. It will also describe the evaluation of historical cost data upon which this method is based. This investigation is essential in developing a method that is rooted in engineering realism and produces credible, dependable results to aid decision makers.

The Need for Integrated Approaches in Metabolic Engineering

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Lechner, Anna; Brunk, Elizabeth; Keasling, Jay D.

2016-08-15

This review highlights state-of-the-art procedures for heterologous small-molecule biosynthesis, the associated bottlenecks, and new strategies that have the potential to accelerate future accomplishments in metabolic engineering. We emphasize that a combination of different approaches over multiple time and size scales must b e considered for successful pathway engineering in a heterologous host. We have classified these optimization procedures based on the "system" that is being manipulated: transcriptome, translatome, proteome, or reactome. By bridging multiple disciplines, including molecular biology, biochemistry, biophysics, and computational sciences, we can create an integral framework for the discovery and implementation of novel biosynthetic production routes.

The thermodynamics of heat- and mass exchange in chemical engineering. Vol. 1. 2. rev. ed.

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Matz, G.

1979-01-01

The second and completely revised edition of the approved textbook 'The thermodynamics of heat- and mass exchange in chemical engineering' is devoted to students of technical and natural science disciplines as well as to practicians and scientists, which are confronted with thermodynamical problems of chemical engineering. Starting from the different phases and properties of matter, the first and the second law of thermodynamics are discussed together with many applications. After an introduction of the equilibrium state, the general principle of similarity for heat- and mass exchange is discussed, considering in particular the heat- and mass exchange in the counter flow between two phases. In a final chapter, the heat- and mass exchange between the vapor- and liquid phase is discussed, with special emphasis on problems as evaporation and drying. (orig./HK) [de

The Purdue Mechanics Freeform Classroom: A New Approach to Engineering Mechanics Education

OpenAIRE

Rhoads, Jeffrey F.; Nauman, Eric; Holloway, Beth M; Krousgrill, Charles Morton

2014-01-01

The [REMOVED] Mechanics Freeform Classroom: A New Approach to Engineering Mechanics EducationMotivated by the need to address the broad spectrum of learning styles embraced by today’sengineering students, a desire to encourage active, peer-to-peer, and self-learning, and a goal ofinteracting with every student despite ever-expanding enrollments, the mechanics faculty at[REMOVED] University have developed the [REMOVED] Mechanics Freeform Classroom(PMFC) -- a new approach to engineering mechani...

Document Clustering Approach for Meta Search Engine

Science.gov (United States)

Kumar, Naresh, Dr.

2017-08-01

The size of WWW is growing exponentially with ever change in technology. This results in huge amount of information with long list of URLs. Manually it is not possible to visit each page individually. So, if the page ranking algorithms are used properly then user search space can be restricted up to some pages of searched results. But available literatures show that no single search system can provide qualitative results from all the domains. This paper provides solution to this problem by introducing a new meta search engine that determine the relevancy of query corresponding to web page and cluster the results accordingly. The proposed approach reduces the user efforts, improves the quality of results and performance of the meta search engine.

Parallel science and engineering applications the Charm++ approach

CERN Document Server

Kale, Laxmikant V

2016-01-01

Developed in the context of science and engineering applications, with each abstraction motivated by and further honed by specific application needs, Charm++ is a production-quality system that runs on almost all parallel computers available. Parallel Science and Engineering Applications: The Charm++ Approach surveys a diverse and scalable collection of science and engineering applications, most of which are used regularly on supercomputers by scientists to further their research. After a brief introduction to Charm++, the book presents several parallel CSE codes written in the Charm++ model, along with their underlying scientific and numerical formulations, explaining their parallelization strategies and parallel performance. These chapters demonstrate the versatility of Charm++ and its utility for a wide variety of applications, including molecular dynamics, cosmology, quantum chemistry, fracture simulations, agent-based simulations, and weather modeling. The book is intended for a wide audience of people i...

Learning intervention and the approach to study of engineering undergraduates

Science.gov (United States)

Solomonides, Ian Paul

The aim of the research was to: investigate the effect of a learning intervention on the Approach to Study of first year engineering degree students. The learning intervention was a local programme of learning to learn' workshops designed and facilitated by the author. The primary aim of these was to develop students' Approaches to Study. Fifty-three first year engineering undergraduates at The Nottingham Trent University participated in the workshops. Approaches to Study were quantified using data obtained from the Revised Approach to Study Inventory (RASI) which was also subjected to a validity and reliability study using local data. Quantitative outcomes were supplemented using a qualitative analysis of essays written by students during the workshops. These were analysed for detail regarding student Approach to Study. It was intended that any findings would inform the local system of Engineering Education, although more general findings also emerged, in particular in relation to the utility of the research instrument. It was concluded that the intervention did not promote the preferential Deep Approach and did not affect Approaches to Study generally as measured by the RASI. This concurred with previous attempts to change student Approaches to Study at the group level. It was also established that subsequent years of the Integrated Engineering degree course are associated with progressively deteriorating Approaches to Study. Students who were exposed to the intervention followed a similar pattern of deteriorating Approaches suggesting that the local course context and its demands had a greater influence over the Approach of students than the intervention did. It was found that academic outcomes were unrelated to the extent to which students took a Deep Approach to the local assessment demands. There appeared therefore to be a mis-match between the Approach students adopted to pass examinations and those that are required for high quality learning outcomes. It is

Multi-scale modeling for sustainable chemical production.

Science.gov (United States)

Zhuang, Kai; Bakshi, Bhavik R; Herrgård, Markus J

2013-09-01

With recent advances in metabolic engineering, it is now technically possible to produce a wide portfolio of existing petrochemical products from biomass feedstock. In recent years, a number of modeling approaches have been developed to support the engineering and decision-making processes associated with the development and implementation of a sustainable biochemical industry. The temporal and spatial scales of modeling approaches for sustainable chemical production vary greatly, ranging from metabolic models that aid the design of fermentative microbial strains to material and monetary flow models that explore the ecological impacts of all economic activities. Research efforts that attempt to connect the models at different scales have been limited. Here, we review a number of existing modeling approaches and their applications at the scales of metabolism, bioreactor, overall process, chemical industry, economy, and ecosystem. In addition, we propose a multi-scale approach for integrating the existing models into a cohesive framework. The major benefit of this proposed framework is that the design and decision-making at each scale can be informed, guided, and constrained by simulations and predictions at every other scale. In addition, the development of this multi-scale framework would promote cohesive collaborations across multiple traditionally disconnected modeling disciplines to achieve sustainable chemical production. Copyright © 2013 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim.

An approach to fabricating chemical sensors based on ZnO nanorod arrays

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Park, Jae Young; Song, Dong Eon; Kim, Sang Sub

2008-01-01

Vertically and laterally aligned ZnO nanorod arrays were synthesized on Pt-coated Si substrates by catalyst-free metal organic chemical vapor deposition. An approach to fabricating chemical sensors based on the nanorod arrays using a coating-and-etching process with a photo-resist is reported. Tests of the devices as oxygen gas sensors have been performed. Our results demonstrate that the approach holds promise for the realization of sensitive and reliable nanorod array chemical sensors

A computational approach to chemical etiologies of diabetes

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Audouze, Karine Marie Laure; Brunak, Søren; Grandjean, Philippe

2013-01-01

Computational meta-analysis can link environmental chemicals to genes and proteins involved in human diseases, thereby elucidating possible etiologies and pathogeneses of non-communicable diseases. We used an integrated computational systems biology approach to examine possible pathogenetic...... linkages in type 2 diabetes (T2D) through genome-wide associations, disease similarities, and published empirical evidence. Ten environmental chemicals were found to be potentially linked to T2D, the highest scores were observed for arsenic, 2,3,7,8-tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin, hexachlorobenzene...

Optimizing Online Suicide Prevention: A Search Engine-Based Tailored Approach.

Science.gov (United States)

Arendt, Florian; Scherr, Sebastian

2017-11-01

Search engines are increasingly used to seek suicide-related information online, which can serve both harmful and helpful purposes. Google acknowledges this fact and presents a suicide-prevention result for particular search terms. Unfortunately, the result is only presented to a limited number of visitors. Hence, Google is missing the opportunity to provide help to vulnerable people. We propose a two-step approach to a tailored optimization: First, research will identify the risk factors. Second, search engines will reweight algorithms according to the risk factors. In this study, we show that the query share of the search term "poisoning" on Google shows substantial peaks corresponding to peaks in actual suicidal behavior. Accordingly, thresholds for showing the suicide-prevention result should be set to the lowest levels during the spring, on Sundays and Mondays, on New Year's Day, and on Saturdays following Thanksgiving. Search engines can help to save lives globally by utilizing a more tailored approach to suicide prevention.

Selective catalytic oxidation of hydrocarbons as a challenge to the chemical engineer

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Emig, G [Erlangen-Nuernberg Univ., Erlangen (Germany, F.R.). Lehrstuhl fuer Technische Chemie 1

1978-08-01

Selective catalytic oxidation is beginning to play a more and more significant role in the process of converting the most important chemical raw materials, crude oil and natural gas, into intermediate and end products. In many cases, this technique makes it possible to replace old processes consisting of many steps by more economical single-step reactions. The typical example of oxidation or ammoxidation of propylene demonstrates the problems which must be solved by the chemical engineer during the development of a heterogeneous catalytic oxidation process. The particular importance of a systematic development of a catalyst is emphasized. General aspects relating to the design of new catalytic processes, or the improvement of existing ones are also discussed.

A Holistic Approach to Delivering Sustainable Design Education in Civil Engineering

Science.gov (United States)

Vemury, Chandra Mouli; Heidrich, Oliver; Thorpe, Neil; Crosbie, Tracey

2018-01-01

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to present pedagogical approaches developed and implemented to deliver sustainable design education (SDE) to second-year undergraduate students on civil engineering programmes in the (then) School of Civil Engineering and Geosciences at Newcastle University. In doing so, the work presented offers an example of…

Advances on a Decision Analytic Approach to Exposure-Based Chemical Prioritization.

Science.gov (United States)

Wood, Matthew D; Plourde, Kenton; Larkin, Sabrina; Egeghy, Peter P; Williams, Antony J; Zemba, Valerie; Linkov, Igor; Vallero, Daniel A

2018-05-11

The volume and variety of manufactured chemicals is increasing, although little is known about the risks associated with the frequency and extent of human exposure to most chemicals. The EPA and the recent signing of the Lautenberg Act have both signaled the need for high-throughput methods to characterize and screen chemicals based on exposure potential, such that more comprehensive toxicity research can be informed. Prior work of Mitchell et al. using multicriteria decision analysis tools to prioritize chemicals for further research is enhanced here, resulting in a high-level chemical prioritization tool for risk-based screening. Reliable exposure information is a key gap in currently available engineering analytics to support predictive environmental and health risk assessments. An elicitation with 32 experts informed relative prioritization of risks from chemical properties and human use factors, and the values for each chemical associated with each metric were approximated with data from EPA's CP_CAT database. Three different versions of the model were evaluated using distinct weight profiles, resulting in three different ranked chemical prioritizations with only a small degree of variation across weight profiles. Future work will aim to include greater input from human factors experts and better define qualitative metrics. © 2018 Society for Risk Analysis.

Integrating Sustainable Development in Chemical Engineering Education: The Application of an Environmental Management System

Science.gov (United States)

Montanes, M. T.; Palomares, A. E.; Sanchez-Tovar, R.

2012-01-01

The principles of sustainable development have been integrated in chemical engineering education by means of an environmental management system. These principles have been introduced in the teaching laboratories where students perform their practical classes. In this paper, the implementation of the environmental management system, the problems…

Systematic engineering of TCA cycle for optimal production of a four-carbon platform chemical 4-hydroxybutyric acid in Escherichia coli.

Science.gov (United States)

Choi, Sol; Kim, Hyun Uk; Kim, Tae Yong; Lee, Sang Yup

2016-11-01

To address climate change and environmental problems, it is becoming increasingly important to establish biorefineries for the production of chemicals from renewable non-food biomass. Here we report the development of Escherichia coli strains capable of overproducing a four-carbon platform chemical 4-hybroxybutyric acid (4-HB). Because 4-HB production is significantly affected by aeration level, genome-scale metabolic model-based engineering strategies were designed under aerobic and microaerobic conditions with emphasis on oxidative/reductive TCA branches and glyoxylate shunt. Several different metabolic engineering strategies were employed to develop strains suitable for fermentation both under aerobic and microaerobic conditions. It was found that microaerobic condition was more efficient than aerobic condition in achieving higher titer and productivity of 4-HB. The final engineered strain produced 103.4g/L of 4-HB by microaerobic fed-batch fermentation using glycerol. The aeration-dependent optimization strategy of TCA cycle will be useful for developing microbial strains producing other reduced derivative chemicals of TCA cycle intermediates. Copyright © 2016 International Metabolic Engineering Society. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Mimicking Neurotransmitter Release in Chemical Synapses via Hysteresis Engineering in MoS2 Transistors.

Science.gov (United States)

Arnold, Andrew J; Razavieh, Ali; Nasr, Joseph R; Schulman, Daniel S; Eichfeld, Chad M; Das, Saptarshi

2017-03-28

Neurotransmitter release in chemical synapses is fundamental to diverse brain functions such as motor action, learning, cognition, emotion, perception, and consciousness. Moreover, improper functioning or abnormal release of neurotransmitter is associated with numerous neurological disorders such as epilepsy, sclerosis, schizophrenia, Alzheimer's disease, and Parkinson's disease. We have utilized hysteresis engineering in a back-gated MoS 2 field effect transistor (FET) in order to mimic such neurotransmitter release dynamics in chemical synapses. All three essential features, i.e., quantal, stochastic, and excitatory or inhibitory nature of neurotransmitter release, were accurately captured in our experimental demonstration. We also mimicked an important phenomenon called long-term potentiation (LTP), which forms the basis of human memory. Finally, we demonstrated how to engineer the LTP time by operating the MoS 2 FET in different regimes. Our findings could provide a critical component toward the design of next-generation smart and intelligent human-like machines and human-machine interfaces.

Differences in Chemical Engineering Student-Faculty Interactions by Student Age and Experience at a Large, Public, Research University

Science.gov (United States)

Ciston, Shannon; Sehgal, Sanya; Mikel, Tressa; Carnasciali, Maria-Isabel

2018-01-01

Adult undergraduate students aged 25+ in engineering disciplines are an important demographic bringing a wealth of life experience to the classroom. This study uses qualitative data drawn from semi-structured interviews with two groups of undergraduate chemical engineering students at a large, public research university: adult students with…

Genetic engineering and sustainable production of ornamentals: current status and future directions.

Science.gov (United States)

Lütken, Henrik; Clarke, Jihong Liu; Müller, Renate

2012-07-01

Through the last decades, environmentally and health-friendly production methods and conscientious use of resources have become crucial for reaching the goal of a more sustainable plant production. Protection of the environment requires careful consumption of limited resources and reduction of chemicals applied during production of ornamental plants. Numerous chemicals used in modern plant production have negative impacts on human health and are hazardous to the environment. In Europe, several compounds have lost their approval and further legal restrictions can be expected. This review presents the more recent progress of genetic engineering in ornamental breeding, delivers an overview of the biological background of the used technologies and critically evaluates the usefulness of the strategies to obtain improved ornamental plants. First, genetic engineering is addressed as alternative to growth retardants, comprising recombinant DNA approaches targeting relevant hormone pathways, e.g. the gibberellic acid (GA) pathway. A reduced content of active GAs causes compact growth and can be facilitated by either decreased anabolism, increased catabolism or altered perception. Moreover, compactness can be accomplished by using a natural transformation approach without recombinant DNA technology. Secondly, metabolic engineering approaches targeting elements of the ethylene signal transduction pathway are summarized as a possible alternative to avoid the use of chemical ethylene inhibitors. In conclusion, molecular breeding approaches are dealt with in a way allowing a critical biological assessment and enabling the scientific community and public to put genetic engineering of ornamental plants into a perspective regarding their usefulness in plant breeding.

Design of chemical plant

International Nuclear Information System (INIS)

Lee, Dong Il; Kim, Seung Jae; Yang, Jae Ho; Ryu, Hwa Won

1993-01-01

This book describes design of chemical plant, which includes chemical engineer and plan for chemical plant, development of chemical process, cost engineering pattern, design and process development, general plant construction plan, project engineering, foundation for economy on assets and depreciation, estimation for cost on capital investment and manufacturing cost, design with computers optimal design and method like fluid mechanics design chemical device and estimation for cost, such as dispatch of material and device writing on design report and appendixes.

A Constrained and Guided Approach for Managing Software Engineering Course Projects

Science.gov (United States)

Cheng, Y.-P.; Lin, J. M.-C.

2010-01-01

This paper documents several years of experimentation with a new approach to organizing and managing projects in a software engineering course. The initial failure and subsequent refinements that the new approach has been through since 2004 are described herein. The "constrained and guided" approach, as it is called, has helped to reduce…

Using Green Chemistry and Engineering Principles to Design, Assess, and Retrofit Chemical Processes for Sustainability

Science.gov (United States)

The concepts of green chemistry and engineering (GC&E) have been promoted as an effective qualitative framework for developing more sustainable chemical syntheses, processes, and material management techniques. This has been demonstrated by many theoretical and practical cases. I...

Under pressure: evolutionary engineering of yeast strains for improved performance in fuels and chemicals production

NARCIS (Netherlands)

Mans, R.; Daran, J.G.; Pronk, J.T.

2018-01-01

Evolutionary engineering, which uses laboratory evolution to select for industrially relevant traits, is a popular strategy in the development of high-performing yeast strains for industrial production of fuels and chemicals. By integrating whole-genome sequencing, bioinformatics, classical

A Decision Analytic Approach to Exposure-Based Chemical ...

Science.gov (United States)

The manufacture of novel synthetic chemicals has increased in volume and variety, but often the environmental and health risks are not fully understood in terms of toxicity and, in particular, exposure. While efforts to assess risks have generally been effective when sufficient data are available, the hazard and exposure data necessary to assess risks adequately are unavailable for the vast majority of chemicals in commerce. The US Environmental Protection Agency has initiated the ExpoCast Program to develop tools for rapid chemical evaluation based on potential for exposure. In this context, a model is presented in which chemicals are evaluated based on inherent chemical properties and behaviorally-based usage characteristics over the chemical’s life cycle. These criteria are assessed and integrated within a decision analytic framework, facilitating rapid assessment and prioritization for future targeted testing and systems modeling. A case study outlines the prioritization process using 51 chemicals. The results show a preliminary relative ranking of chemicals based on exposure potential. The strength of this approach is the ability to integrate relevant statistical and mechanistic data with expert judgment, allowing for an initial tier assessment that can further inform targeted testing and risk management strategies. The National Exposure Research Laboratory′s (NERL′s) Human Exposure and Atmospheric Sciences Division (HEASD) conducts research in suppor

An Iterative and Incremental Approach for E-Learning Ontology Engineering

Directory of Open Access Journals (Sweden)

Sudath Rohitha Heiyanthuduwage

2009-03-01

Full Text Available Abstract - There is a boost in the interest on ontology with the developments in Semantic Web technologies. Ontologies play a vital role in semantic web. Even though there is lot of work done on ontology, still a standard framework for ontology engineering has not been defined. Even though current ontology engineering methodologies are available they need improvements. The effort of our work is to integrate various methods, techniques, tools and etc to different stages of proposed ontology engineering life cycle to create a comprehensive framework for ontology engineering. Current methodologies discuss ontology engineering stages and collaborative environments with user collaboration. However, discussion on increasing effectiveness and correct inference has been given less attention. More over, these methodologies provide little discussion on usability of domain ontologies. We consider these aspects as more important in our work. Also, ontology engineering has been done for various domains and for various purposes. Our effort is to propose an iterative and incremental approach for ontology engineering especially for e-learning domain with the intention of achieving a higher usability and effectiveness of e-learning systems. This paper introduces different aspects of the proposed ontology engineering framework and evaluation of it.

Computer Applications in Balancing Chemical Equations.

Science.gov (United States)

Kumar, David D.

2001-01-01

Discusses computer-based approaches to balancing chemical equations. Surveys 13 methods, 6 based on matrix, 2 interactive programs, 1 stand-alone system, 1 developed in algorithm in Basic, 1 based on design engineering, 1 written in HyperCard, and 1 prepared for the World Wide Web. (Contains 17 references.) (Author/YDS)

[DIFFERENT APPROACHES FOR CHEMICAL RISK ASSESSMENT IN LABORATORIES].

Science.gov (United States)

Caporossi, Lidia; Papaleo, Bruno; Capanna, Silvia; Calicchia, Sara; Marcellini, Laura; De Rosa, Mariangela; Castellano, Paola

2015-01-01

The aim of this study was to compare the different approaches used for chemical risk assessment, in relation to the perception of riskfor operators, in some research laboratories of a hospital in Rome. All information regarding the chemicals used for the application of three algorithmic models for chemical risk assessment ("Movarisch", "Inforisk", "Archimede") were collected. An environmental and biological monitoring and a study on the combined exposure to multiple chemicals using the World Health Organization proposed steps were carried out. A questionnaire was prepared for the identification of risk perception. An estimation of chemical risk with algorithms was compared with data from monitoring: findings showed that estimated risk was higher than those identified with airborne or urine concentrations, always under their limit values. The study of multiple exposure showed a possible cumulative risk, in some cases, but the conditions of use (volume and time) often bring to a reduced one. The perception of risk attributed to the monitored hazardous substances showed a correct perception in all laboratories and for all workers, with regard to the substances manipulated.

Agile Service Development: A Rule-Based Method Engineering Approach

NARCIS (Netherlands)

dr. Martijn Zoet; Stijn Hoppenbrouwers; Inge van de Weerd; Johan Versendaal

2011-01-01

Agile software development has evolved into an increasingly mature software development approach and has been applied successfully in many software vendors’ development departments. In this position paper, we address the broader agile service development. Based on method engineering principles we

Perspectives in metabolic engineering: understanding cellular regulation towards the control of metabolic routes.

Science.gov (United States)

Zadran, Sohila; Levine, Raphael D

2013-01-01

Metabolic engineering seeks to redirect metabolic pathways through the modification of specific biochemical reactions or the introduction of new ones with the use of recombinant technology. Many of the chemicals synthesized via introduction of product-specific enzymes or the reconstruction of entire metabolic pathways into engineered hosts that can sustain production and can synthesize high yields of the desired product as yields of natural product-derived compounds are frequently low, and chemical processes can be both energy and material expensive; current endeavors have focused on using biologically derived processes as alternatives to chemical synthesis. Such economically favorable manufacturing processes pursue goals related to sustainable development and "green chemistry". Metabolic engineering is a multidisciplinary approach, involving chemical engineering, molecular biology, biochemistry, and analytical chemistry. Recent advances in molecular biology, genome-scale models, theoretical understanding, and kinetic modeling has increased interest in using metabolic engineering to redirect metabolic fluxes for industrial and therapeutic purposes. The use of metabolic engineering has increased the productivity of industrially pertinent small molecules, alcohol-based biofuels, and biodiesel. Here, we highlight developments in the practical and theoretical strategies and technologies available for the metabolic engineering of simple systems and address current limitations.

The Navy/NASA Engine Program (NNEP89): Interfacing the program for the calculation of complex Chemical Equilibrium Compositions (CEC)

Science.gov (United States)

Gordon, Sanford

1991-01-01

The NNEP is a general computer program for calculating aircraft engine performance. NNEP has been used extensively to calculate the design and off-design (matched) performance of a broad range of turbine engines, ranging from subsonic turboprops to variable cycle engines for supersonic transports. Recently, however, there has been increased interest in applications for which NNEP is not capable of simulating, such as the use of alternate fuels including cryogenic fuels and the inclusion of chemical dissociation effects at high temperatures. To overcome these limitations, NNEP was extended by including a general chemical equilibrium method. This permits consideration of any propellant system and the calculation of performance with dissociation effects. The new extended program is referred to as NNEP89.

Cyanobacteria: Promising biocatalysts for sustainable chemical production.

Science.gov (United States)

Knoot, Cory J; Ungerer, Justin; Wangikar, Pramod P; Pakrasi, Himadri B

2018-04-06

Cyanobacteria are photosynthetic prokaryotes showing great promise as biocatalysts for the direct conversion of CO 2 into fuels, chemicals, and other value-added products. Introduction of just a few heterologous genes can endow cyanobacteria with the ability to transform specific central metabolites into many end products. Recent engineering efforts have centered around harnessing the potential of these microbial biofactories for sustainable production of chemicals conventionally produced from fossil fuels. Here, we present an overview of the unique chemistry that cyanobacteria have been co-opted to perform. We highlight key lessons learned from these engineering efforts and discuss advantages and disadvantages of various approaches. © 2018 by The American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Inc.

System engineering approach to GPM retrieval algorithms

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Rose, C. R. (Chris R.); Chandrasekar, V.

2004-01-01

System engineering principles and methods are very useful in large-scale complex systems for developing the engineering requirements from end-user needs. Integrating research into system engineering is a challenging task. The proposed Global Precipitation Mission (GPM) satellite will use a dual-wavelength precipitation radar to measure and map global precipitation with unprecedented accuracy, resolution and areal coverage. The satellite vehicle, precipitation radars, retrieval algorithms, and ground validation (GV) functions are all critical subsystems of the overall GPM system and each contributes to the success of the mission. Errors in the radar measurements and models can adversely affect the retrieved output values. Ground validation (GV) systems are intended to provide timely feedback to the satellite and retrieval algorithms based on measured data. These GV sites will consist of radars and DSD measurement systems and also have intrinsic constraints. One of the retrieval algorithms being studied for use with GPM is the dual-wavelength DSD algorithm that does not use the surface reference technique (SRT). The underlying microphysics of precipitation structures and drop-size distributions (DSDs) dictate the types of models and retrieval algorithms that can be used to estimate precipitation. Many types of dual-wavelength algorithms have been studied. Meneghini (2002) analyzed the performance of single-pass dual-wavelength surface-reference-technique (SRT) based algorithms. Mardiana (2003) demonstrated that a dual-wavelength retrieval algorithm could be successfully used without the use of the SRT. It uses an iterative approach based on measured reflectivities at both wavelengths and complex microphysical models to estimate both No and Do at each range bin. More recently, Liao (2004) proposed a solution to the Do ambiguity problem in rain within the dual-wavelength algorithm and showed a possible melting layer model based on stratified spheres. With the No and Do

The Conceptual Change Approach to Teaching Chemical Equilibrium

Science.gov (United States)

Canpolat, Nurtac; Pinarbasi, Tacettin; Bayrakceken, Samih; Geban, Omer

2006-01-01

This study investigates the effect of a conceptual change approach over traditional instruction on students' understanding of chemical equilibrium concepts (e.g. dynamic nature of equilibrium, definition of equilibrium constant, heterogeneous equilibrium, qualitative interpreting of equilibrium constant, changing the reaction conditions). This…

Expanding the chemical diversity of natural esters by engineering a polyketide-derived pathway into Escherichia coli.

Science.gov (United States)

Menendez-Bravo, Simón; Comba, Santiago; Sabatini, Martín; Arabolaza, Ana; Gramajo, Hugo

2014-07-01

Microbial fatty acid (FA)-derived molecules have emerged as promising alternatives to petroleum-based chemicals for reducing dependence on fossil hydrocarbons. However, native FA biosynthetic pathways often yield limited structural diversity, and therefore restricted physicochemical properties, of the end products by providing only a limited variety of usually linear hydrocarbons. Here we have engineered into Escherichia coli a mycocerosic polyketide synthase-based biosynthetic pathway from Mycobacterium tuberculosis and redefined its biological role towards the production of multi-methyl-branched-esters (MBEs) with novel chemical structures. Expression of FadD28, Mas and PapA5 enzymes enabled the biosynthesis of multi-methyl-branched-FA and their further esterification to an alcohol. The high substrate tolerance of these enzymes towards different FA and alcohol moieties resulted in the biosynthesis of a broad range of MBE. Further metabolic engineering of the MBE producer strain coupled this system to long-chain-alcohol biosynthetic pathways resulting in de novo production of branched wax esters following addition of only propionate. Copyright © 2014 International Metabolic Engineering Society. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

The international symposium on 'chemical engineering of gas-liquid-solid catalyst reactions'

Energy Technology Data Exchange (ETDEWEB)

Hammer, H

1978-06-01

A report on the International Symposium on ''Chemical Engineering of Gas-Liquid-Solid Catalyst Reactions'', sponsored by the University of Liege (3/2-3/78), covers papers on the hydrodynamics, modeling and simulation, operating behavior, and chemical kinetics of trickle-bed reactors; scale-up of a trickle-bed reactor for hydrotreating Kuwait vacuum distillate; experimental results obtained in trickle-bed reactors for hydroprocessing atmospheric residua, hydrogenation of methylstyrene, hydrogenation of butanone, and hydrodemetallization of petroleum residua; advantages and disadvantages of various three-phase reactor types (e.g., for the liquid-phase hydrogenation of carbon monoxide to benzene, SNG, or methanol) and hydrodynamics, mass and heat transfer, and modeling of bubble columns with suspended catalysts (slurry reactors), and their applications (e.g., in SNG and fermentation processes).

HYPER-­TVT: Development and Implementation of an Interactive Learning Environment for Students of Chemical and Process Engineering

Science.gov (United States)

Santoro, Marina; Mazzotti, Marco

2006-01-01

Hyper-TVT is a computer-aided education system that has been developed at the Institute of Process Engineering at the ETH Zurich. The aim was to create an interactive learning environment for chemical and process engineering students. The topics covered are the most important multistage separation processes, i.e. fundamentals of separation…

Regenerative endodontics as a tissue engineering approach: past, current and future.

Science.gov (United States)

Malhotra, Neeraj; Mala, Kundabala

2012-12-01

With the reported startling statistics of high incidence of tooth decay and tooth loss, the current interest is focused on the development of alternate dental tissue replacement therapies. This has led to the application of dental tissue engineering as a clinically relevant method for the regeneration of dental tissues and generation of bioengineered whole tooth. Although, tissue engineering approach requires the three main key elements of stem cells, scaffold and morphogens, a conductive environment (fourth element) is equally important for successful engineering of any tissue and/or organ. The applications of this science has evolved continuously in dentistry, beginning from the application of Ca(OH)(2) in vital pulp therapy to the development of a fully functional bioengineered tooth (mice). Thus, with advances in basic research, recent reports and studies have shown successful application of tissue engineering in the field of dentistry. However, certain practical obstacles are yet to be overcome before dental tissue regeneration can be applied as evidence-based approach in clinics. The article highlights on the past achievements, current developments and future prospects of tissue engineering and regenerative therapy in the field of endodontics and bioengineered teeth (bioteeth). © 2012 The Authors. Australian Endodontic Journal © 2012 Australian Society of Endodontology.

Shaping the Future Landscape: Catchment Systems Engineering and the Decision Support Matrix Approach

Science.gov (United States)

Hewett, Caspar; Quinn, Paul; Wilkinson, Mark; Wainwright, John

2017-04-01

Land degradation is widely recognised as one of the great environmental challenges facing humanity today, much of which is directly associated with human activity. The negative impacts of climate change and of the way in which we have engineered the landscape through, for example, agriculture intensification and deforestation, need to be addressed. However, the answer is not a simple matter of doing the opposite of current practice. Nor is non-intervention a viable option. There is a need to bring together approaches from the natural and social sciences both to understand the issues and to act to solve real problems. We propose combining a Catchment Systems Engineering (CSE) approach that builds on existing approaches such as Natural Water Retention Measures, Green infrastructure and Nature-Based Solutions with a multi-scale framework for decision support that has been successfully applied to diffuse pollution and flood risk management. The CSE philosophy follows that of Earth Systems Engineering and Management, which aims to engineer and manage complex coupled human-natural systems in a highly integrated, rational manner. CSE is multi-disciplinary, and necessarily involves a wide range of subject areas including anthropology, engineering, environmental science, ethics and philosophy. It offers a rational approach which accepts the fact that we need to engineer and act to improve the functioning of the existing catchment entity on which we rely. The decision support framework proposed draws on physical and mathematical modelling; Participatory Action Research; and demonstration sites at which practical interventions are implemented. It is predicated on the need to work with stakeholders to co-produce knowledge that leads to proactive interventions to reverse the land degradation we observe today while sustaining the agriculture humanity needs. The philosophy behind CSE and examples of where it has been applied successfully are presented. The Decision Support Matrix

ChemEngine: harvesting 3D chemical structures of supplementary data from PDF files.

Science.gov (United States)

Karthikeyan, Muthukumarasamy; Vyas, Renu

2016-01-01

Digital access to chemical journals resulted in a vast array of molecular information that is now available in the supplementary material files in PDF format. However, extracting this molecular information, generally from a PDF document format is a daunting task. Here we present an approach to harvest 3D molecular data from the supporting information of scientific research articles that are normally available from publisher's resources. In order to demonstrate the feasibility of extracting truly computable molecules from PDF file formats in a fast and efficient manner, we have developed a Java based application, namely ChemEngine. This program recognizes textual patterns from the supplementary data and generates standard molecular structure data (bond matrix, atomic coordinates) that can be subjected to a multitude of computational processes automatically. The methodology has been demonstrated via several case studies on different formats of coordinates data stored in supplementary information files, wherein ChemEngine selectively harvested the atomic coordinates and interpreted them as molecules with high accuracy. The reusability of extracted molecular coordinate data was demonstrated by computing Single Point Energies that were in close agreement with the original computed data provided with the articles. It is envisaged that the methodology will enable large scale conversion of molecular information from supplementary files available in the PDF format into a collection of ready- to- compute molecular data to create an automated workflow for advanced computational processes. Software along with source codes and instructions available at https://sourceforge.net/projects/chemengine/files/?source=navbar.Graphical abstract.

Multi-hazard approaches to civil infrastructure engineering

CERN Document Server

LaFave, James

2016-01-01

This collection focuses on the development of novel approaches to address one of the most pressing challenges of civil engineering, namely the mitigation of natural hazards. Numerous engineering books to date have focused on, and illustrate considerable progress toward, mitigation of individual hazards (earthquakes, wind, and so forth.). The current volume addresses concerns related to overall safety, sustainability and resilience of the built environment when subject to multiple hazards: natural disaster events that are concurrent and either correlated (e.g., wind and surge); uncorrelated (e.g., earthquake and flood); cascading (e.g., fire following earthquake); or uncorrelated and occurring at different times (e.g., wind and earthquake). The authors examine a range of specific topics including methodologies for vulnerability assessment of structures, new techniques to reduce the system demands through control systems; instrumentation, monitoring and condition assessment of structures and foundations; new te...

Progressively Fostering Students' Chemical Information Skills in a Three-Year Chemical Engineering Program in France

Science.gov (United States)

Gozzi, Christel; Arnoux, Marie-Jose´; Breuzard, Jere´my; Marchal, Claire; Nikitine, Clémence; Renaudat, Alice; Toulgoat, Fabien

2016-01-01

Literature searches are essential for scientists. Thus, courses on how to do a good literature search have been integrated in studies at CPE Lyon for many years. Recently, we modified our pedagogical approach in order to initiate students progressively in the search for chemical information. In addition, this new teaching organization is now based…

Chemical control of flowering time

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Ionescu, Irina Alexandra; Møller, Birger Lindberg; Sánchez Pérez, Raquel

2017-01-01

Flowering at the right time is of great importance; it secures seed production and therefore species survival and crop yield. In addition to the genetic network controlling flowering time, there are a number of much less studied metabolites and exogenously applied chemicals that may influence...... on the genetic aspects of flowering time regulation in annuals, but less so in perennials. An alternative to plant breeding approaches is to engineer flowering time chemically via the external application of flower-inducing compounds. This review discusses a variety of exogenously applied compounds used in fruit...

Advances in metabolic pathway and strain engineering paving the way for sustainable production of chemical building blocks

DEFF Research Database (Denmark)

Chen, Yun; Nielsen, Jens

2013-01-01

Bio-based production of chemical building blocks from renewable resources is an attractive alternative to petroleum-based platform chemicals. Metabolic pathway and strain engineering is the key element in constructing robust microbial chemical factories within the constraints of cost effective...... production. Here we discuss how the development of computational algorithms, novel modules and methods, omics-based techniques combined with modeling refinement are enabling reduction in development time and thus advance the field of industrial biotechnology. We further discuss how recent technological...

Effect of Continuous Assessment on Learning Outcomes on Two Chemical Engineering Courses: Case Study

Science.gov (United States)

Tuunila, R.; Pulkkinen, M.

2015-01-01

In this paper, the effect of continuous assessment on the learning outcomes of two chemical engineering courses is studied over a several-year period. Average grades and passing percentages of courses after the final examination are reported and also student feedback on the courses is collected. The results indicate significantly better learning…

Fast engineering optimization: A novel highly effective control parameterization approach for industrial dynamic processes.

Science.gov (United States)

Liu, Ping; Li, Guodong; Liu, Xinggao

2015-09-01

Control vector parameterization (CVP) is an important approach of the engineering optimization for the industrial dynamic processes. However, its major defect, the low optimization efficiency caused by calculating the relevant differential equations in the generated nonlinear programming (NLP) problem repeatedly, limits its wide application in the engineering optimization for the industrial dynamic processes. A novel highly effective control parameterization approach, fast-CVP, is first proposed to improve the optimization efficiency for industrial dynamic processes, where the costate gradient formulae is employed and a fast approximate scheme is presented to solve the differential equations in dynamic process simulation. Three well-known engineering optimization benchmark problems of the industrial dynamic processes are demonstrated as illustration. The research results show that the proposed fast approach achieves a fine performance that at least 90% of the computation time can be saved in contrast to the traditional CVP method, which reveals the effectiveness of the proposed fast engineering optimization approach for the industrial dynamic processes. Copyright © 2015 ISA. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.