University of Kentucky

Chemical engineering emerged over a century ago when engineering professionals were needed to design and implement processes for large, commercial scale chemical production. Modern chemical engineering combines knowledge of chemistry and molecular interactions with the discipline of engineering to address problems at both the small scale (designing nanodevices, for example) and the large scale (bringing chemistry out of the lab to the full scale production of items that we use every day). Chemical engineers invent new processes, improve existing ones and designand operate plants and equipment to transform raw feed stocks into useful products across a wide range of industries including agricultural and food-based products, consumer products, fine chemicals, fuels and petrochemicals, pharmaceuticals, plastics and electronic materials.