Chemical Engineering

About

ChE-About

ChE 434 is a logical extension of the first semester of chemical engineering senior design.

The abilities developed over a wide range of chemical engineering courses are now applied to a problem extending
over a somewhat longer period of time; requiring more initiative, enterprise, care, and a greater measure of individual responsibility. For the 41st successive year, we have worked the American Institute o f Chemical Engineers (AIChE) Student Contest Problem. We use these industry designed problems for three reasons:   1) they are well-rounded problems, 2) they tell our students and our faculty something about the kind
of abilities that industrial companies would like graduating chemical engineers to have, and 3) there is the advantage of seeing how well our students compare with graduates of other universities in a national competition of this quality.

For Design Day, 5 teams and 5 individuals were chosen to present their design via a poster presentation. From this final group, 2 teams of two and 2 individuals will be chosen to compete in the national AIChE competition in the fall. Since 1968, about half the students whose reports rated first or second at MSU also finished among the top six nationally.

The ChEMS department at MSU offers ChE 491, a senior Selected Topics Course. This section of Selected Topics is titled Brewing and Distilled Beverage Technology. The objective of the course is to teach students the fundamentals of brewing and distilled beverage production from a biochemical engineering perspective. Lectures and laboratories for this class take place at the Michigan Brewing Company in Webberville, MI.

Topics discussed include raw materials for fermentation; basics of alcohol fermentation; basics of distillation; production of brandy, whiskey, vodka, and gin; and flavor chemistry. In addition, students will learn the background of the industry of beverage distillation, including the tax law’s and regulations involved w’ith this business. Laboratory projects include simple pot distillation, whiskey production, vodka production, and barrel aging of spirits.

For a list of projects, see Chemical Engineering Projects.

More information can be found at Chemical Engineering & Materials Science.