Product Engineering

The current chemical engineering curriculum concentrates on process: the efficient manufacturing in quantity of traditional chemical products such as ammonia and benzene. However, many chemical companies now invent and manufacture specialty products with particular properties such as pharmaceuticals, cosmetics, and electronic coatings, and their employees need to know how to design the products as well as manufacture them. James Wei, a famous chemical engineer, is writing this book to provide theories and case studies in product engineering the design of new, useful products with desired properties. The first section relates historical case studies of successful product invention and development by individuals and companies. The second part of the book describes the toolbox of molecular structure-property relations. A desired product needs to have certain properties (for example, phase transition or thermal properties) and the chemist must find or design a molecular structure with the required properties This section will instruct chemists in the analysis of structure and property information. The third section is concerned with the next stage: product research and design. It will discuss improving the desired product by additives and blending, among other strategies. It will also cover future challenges in product engineering.