Download PDF Chemical Engineering: Visions of the World by R.C Darton

Sinopsis

This essay set outs some speculations about the changing role of Chemical Engineering in the 21st century. To this end, I first look back well beyond my own undergraduate experiences of Chemical Engineering at Sydney University in the 1950’s to the earlier shape and traditions of the subject. I then sketch a personal vision of how ever-accelerating advances in our understanding of the molecular machinery of life, and the consequent biotechnological applications, are likely to affect us, bringing both new benefits and new problems. Chemical Engineering, defined more broadly than most current practitioners can imagine and shading into biomedicine, will be at the heart of delivering the benefits, and caught up in most of the problems. Specifically, I will touch on: implications for curricula, and the linked question of attracting adequate numbers of able students; patterns of partnership between academia and industry; questions of intellectual property, and what should and should not be patentable. I will conclude with thoughts about the interplay between science/ engineering and society.

Content

1. Opening Address: Chemical Engineering and Tomorrow’s World
2. Chemical Engineering
3. The Future Shape of the Process Industries
4. The Chemical Engineer and the Community
5. Chemical Engineering: The Practice of the Profession “Pace, Price, Perplexities”
6. Formulation of a Vision: Chemical Engineering in the 21st Century
7. Commentary on the Visions

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