Jiff• department

New home of Chemical Engineering Department at Mountaintop Campus. LEHIGH UNIVERSITY

HUGO S. CARAM, JOHN C. CHEN Lehigh University plines. The University takes pride in its highly com­ Bethlehem, PA 18015-4791 petitive curricula in science and technology, the arts and humanities, and business and economics. Current HE CHEMICAL engineering program at Lehigh enrollment is approximately 4,300 undergraduate and Tstarted in 1907 and followed the growth of Lehigh 2,000 graduate students. The Chemical Engineering University from a small undergraduate school to its Department has the largest graduate program of any current research university status. The department single department at the University and accounts for has been characterized by a creative and personalized approximately one out of every five PhD degrees approach to undergraduate education, complemented granted by Lehigh. by steady growth of its graduate and research ac­ Lehigh University's educational philosophy is tivities. It is currently among the larger chemical en­ based on the premise that preparation for successful gineering departments in the U.S., with 22 faculty living must combine the acquisition of knowledge and members, approximately 150 undergraduate stu­ skills necessary to the profession with the develop­ dents, 95 resident graduate students, and 30 part-time ment of humanistic values and ethics that enrich per­ graduate students. In the past three years the depart­ sonal life. Thus, the University's emphasis for a liberal ment has graduated an average of forty BS, twenty­ education combines the professional with the cultural, five MS, and fourteen PhD students per year. the practical with the ideal, and the functional with Founded in 1865, Lehigh University is an inde­ the esthetic. pendent, co-educational institution dedicated to the The University is located in the city of Bethlehem, advancement of knowledge in a wide range of disci- in the Lehigh Valley of eastern Pennsylvania. The

© Copyright ChE Division ASEE 1989

58 CHEMICAL ENGINEERING EDUCATION area, with a population of half a million, supports a higher value-added products, concerns with quality significant cultural life of its own as well as offering and safety, and intense competitiveness in develop­ easy access to the metropolitan environments of New ment and production. Our response as an academic York and Philadelphia, and to the outdoor recreational department was to opportunities of the Pocono Mountains, the Delaware River Basin, and the New Jersey Shore. • Affirm the importance of fundamentals in science, The University is situated on three adjoining cam­ mathematics, and engineering basics for both under­ puses covering 1,500 acres of South Mountain and the graduate and graduate curricula neighboring valleys. The Chemical Engineering De­ • Nurture and develop students' "intellectual nimbleness," partment is now based in the Tower Building of the the ability to define problems, apply critical faculties, op­ timize solutions, integrate knowledge from multiple discip­ new Mountaintop Campus, a beautiful 700 acre site lines and work effectively in interpersonal relationships along the summit of South Mountain. • Develop the very best research capabilities of international stature in a few selected areas of chemical engineering. THE WAY WE WERE Chemical engineering at Lehigh University In pursuit of the above goals, the following initia­ started as a program in the Department of Chemistry, tives were taken. and the first chemical engineering degree was awarded in 1907. By the early 1930's, some twenty to Along with the entire profession, our department thirty Bachelor degrees and three to four Masters de­ has undergone intense self-scrutiny and clarification grees were being awarded each year in chemical en­ of objectives in the past six years ... triggered gineering. Distinguished faculty of the 1940's included by ... [the challenge] of rapid technical developments, the variety of products and applications ... emphasis on Darrell Mack, Vincent Uhl, and Harvey Neville. 1952 higher value-added products, concerns with quality marked the beginning of the "new" program at and safety ... competitiveness in development ... Lehigh. In that year chemical engineering was for­ mally recognized as an independent academic depart­ ment, and Leonard A. Wenzel and Alan S. Foust Undergraduate curriculum • A better-integ­ joined the faculty, the latter to serve as its first chair­ rated curriculum has been instituted which more effi­ man. In short order, Curtis W. Clump, Bryce Ander­ ciently covers the fundamentals of chemistry, physics, son, and Louis Maus also joined the department and natural sciences, mathematics, and engineering sci­ together with Foust and Wenzel began building the ence, with room for a substantial amount of elective modern department of today. That effort included options. writing of the classic textbook Principles of Unit Op­ erations. In 1962, Leonard Wenzel became chairman Laboratory Instruction • The old "unit operations and oversaw the move of the department to the new laboratory" had lost favor in the 60's and 70's for many Whitaker Laboratory Building in 1965. By the time departments across the country. The importance of Len left the chairmanship in 1983, the department had hands-on laboratory experience in an engineering con­ won a place among the well-regarded chemical en­ text was reaffirmed, and we have just completed a gineering programs in the country, graduating some four-year development effort, at a cost of over $1 mil­ sixty BS, twenty-eight MS, and two PhD's per year. lion, to enhance both the physical facilities and the John C. Chen assumed the chairmanship in 1983 and, instructional content of our undergraduate process en­ with the current faculty, has continued to pursue en­ gineering laboratories. The fifteen new experiments hanced quality in both the educational and research provide students with experience in both classical programs of the department. technology (heat and mass transfer, thermodynamics, distillation, etc.) as well as some of the advanced technologies (membrane separation, digital process RECENT INITIATIVES control, bioengineering, etc.). Along with the entire profession, our department has undergone intense self-scrutiny and clarification Undergraduate Research • With sponsorship by of objectives in the past six years. This was triggered an educational foundation and a dozen companies, a by a realization that today chemical engineering is new program called Opportunity for Student Innova­ challenged by rapid technical developments, a great tion (OSI) was started in 1987. Teams of senior stu­ variety of products and applications, emphasis on dents work with faculty advisors and industrial men-

SPRING 1989 59 tors on research projects that arise from real needs of tivity is promoted by the Emulsion Polymers Insti­ the industrial companies. This attempt to foster the tute, co-directed by John Vanderhoff and Mohamed students' critical faculty for problem definition and El-Aasser. Currently active projects pursue the prep­ solution has generated enthusiastic interest and active aration of special monosize polymer particles, the mor­ participation by students, faculty, and industrial phology of composite polymer particles, the kinetics, partners. transport phenomena, and modeling of emulsion polymerization processes, the absorption of various New Facilities • Having outgrown its home of molecules on surface of latex particles, and the twenty years in Whitaker Laboratory, the depart­ phenomena of copolymerization and inverse emulsion ment was moved to the newly acquired Mountaintop polymerization. The research activity in polymer col­ Campus in the Summer of 1988. Offices, classrooms, loids is strongly supported by an industrial consortium seminar rooms, and laboratories are all integrated ir of over fifty companies. Research on polymer mater­ the 200,000 square feet Tower Building. An additional ials has concentrated on multicomponent polymers. 10,000 square feet of engineering laboratory space is Specific projects have studied interpenetrating net­ also available to chemical engineering in a neighboring work composites, neutron scattering characterization pilot-plant building. For the first time in two decades, techniques, block copolymers, and the engineering properties of polymeric materials. Research in process modeling and control has the Teams of senior students work with faculty advisors and industrial mentors on research projects objective of using advanced computer science to de­ that arise from real needs of the industrial companies ... velop novel approaches for dynamic modeling, simula­ This ... has generated enthusiastic interest and active tion, and control of industrial chemical processes. Ac­ participation by students, faculty, and industry ... tive projects include the modeling and control of batch reactors, the design of nonlinear and multivariable nearly all of the chemical engineering faculty and their control structures, the design and control of energy­ research programs are located together at a single conserving distillation systems, the development of site. Campus-wide communications were also signifi­ improved numerical integration methods, the use of cantly enhanced by a fiber-optic computer network. artificial intelligence in process control, and the appli­ cation of statistical control schemes. Activities in this RESEARCH area are organized in a Center for Process Modeling Research is the heart of our department's graduate and Control, co-directed by Christos Georgakis and activity. With the intention of concentrating in William Luyben, and are supported by an industrial selected areas, the faculty has developed focused consortium of a dozen companies. thrusts in bioprocessing, polymer science and en­ While technical specializations are highly varied gineering, process modeling and control, and multi­ within the multi-phase processing research activity, phase processing. Approximately a quarter of the fac­ the common theme is concern with interfacial ulty members are involved in each of these four areas. phenomena as found in multiphase systems. Faculty The research in bioprocessing is focused on the op­ interests reflect the wide range of industrial processes erations required for manufacture and isolation of dependent upon multiphase processing technology. biological products. Faculty and students are cur­ Active projects include the studies of plasma etching rently investigating the fundamental kinetics of micro­ of semiconductor materials, heterogeneous catalysts bial, enzyme, and mammalian cell systems, the design for production of synthetic fuels, laser Raman spec­ and scale up ofbioreactors, the development of on-line troscopy to characterize surface oxides on substrates instrumentation, and novel separation/purification for improved catalysts, phase equilibria of multicom­ schemes for recovery of biologically active species. ponent fluid mixtures, fluid mechanics of spouted beds These activities are coordinated through the BioPro- and the flow of granular materials, fluid mechanics ,cessing Institute, directed by Janice A. Phillips, as a and heat transfer in both bubbling and circulating part of Lehigh University's Center for Molecular Bio­ fluidized beds, and multicomponent evaporation and sciences and Biotechnology, directed by Arthur E. condensation. Much of the research is coordinated Humphrey. through the Institute of Thermo-Fluid Engineering, The polymer program at Lehigh is an interdis­ the Zettlemoyer Center for Surface Science, and the ciplinary activity pursuing research in polymer col­ Energy Research Center. loids and polymer materials. The polymer colloids ac- Due partly to the department's selective focus in

60 CHEMICAL ENGINEERING EDUCATION ~ Professor Fred Stein and a graduate student measure VLE of flu id mixtures.

't Professor Christos Georgakis confets with a group of grad­ uate students.

t Professor John C. Chen Department Chairman.

• Professor Hugo S. Caram inspects the research appa­ ratus of a graduate student.

the above four research areas, we are enjoying a major administrative responsibilities. In 1962 Len be­ period of growth and effervescent enthusiasm. Since came chairman of the department and held that posi­ 1983, research funding has grown at an average an­ tion for twenty-one years. Curt took on the respon­ nual rate of over 30%, resulting in a research budget sibilities of Associate Dean for Undergraduate Educa­ of $3 million per year. The department's graduate edu­ tion in the College of Engineering over the period of cational program has seen a shift from the MS towards 1975 to 1988. Both retired as distinguished emeritus the PhD program. In a five-year span, the fraction of professors but remain active in the department. resident students studying for the doctoral degree has The sixties brought additional new blood, with two increased from 30% to 70%, and the average number former Lehigh undergraduates joining the depart­ of PhD degrees granted per year has increased from ment. William E. Schiesser came in 1960, followed 4 to 14, ranking us, on this basis, among the top ten by Fred P. Stein in 1963. Bill (now the R. L Mc Cann departments in the U.S. Professor) obtained his PhD at Princeton under the late Leon Lapidus and brought with him an interest THE FACULTY in numerical analysis and computer methods that has In the spring of 1989 the department faculty con­ continued unabated to this day. Fred came from sists of sixteen full-time faculty, three faculty with graduate work at the University of Michigan and joint appointments (with other departments), two ac­ brought an abiding interest in thermodynamics. In ad­ tive emeritus professors, and one adjunct faculty. dition to the substantial responsibility of being the What follows is a brief introduction to each of our associate chairman, Fred is now extending his work colleagues, in the chronological order of their joining on thermodynamics into state equations for electro­ the Lehigh staff. lytes, reactive solution theory, and the effects of ther­ First on the scene were Leonard A. Wenzel and modynamic data uncertainty on process design. Curtis W. Clump, who came from the University of Leslie H. Sperling and William L. Luyben came Michigan and Carnegie Institute of Technology in 1951 from Duke and Delaware, respectively, via Buckeye and 1954, respectively. Along with Alan Foust, Curt Cellulose Co. and Dupont, in 1967. The mechanical and Len were instrumental in laying the foundation properties of polymers and composites are Les's core for our department of today. In addition to their own research interest. He applies his results to interpene­ teaching and research efforts, each came to assume trating polymer networks, sound and vibration damp-

SPRING 1989 61 ening, and to novel adhesives and binders. This is biotech-biomed areas. explored at the molecular level with such techniques The late seventies brought Hugo S. Caram (1977), as neutron scattering. Bill brought process control to Cesar A. Silebi (1978), and Andrew Klein (1979). Lehigh. He has been extremely active in the analysis Hugo was the first Minnesota PhD (studied under of distillation processes and has added to the sophisti­ Amundson) to join the department. With an initial in­ cated technology of what is currently the dominant terest in reactor analysis, he has now moved to study separation technique in the chemical industry. Bill has the flow of fluidized and granular media. Flow visuali­ written a well-recognized process control textboo1 zation and fiber optic probes are some of the tools in and more recently, in collaboration with Len Wenzel, these systems. Cesar is the only Lehigh PhD on our a sophomore text reflecting their personal philosophy faculty. He has expanded the work he started under on undergraduate teaching. Les has also just pub­ developed and expanded the work he started under lished a book on composites, reflecting the state of the Anthony McHugh (now at the University of Illinois, art in this exciting field. Urbana) on the separation of colloidal particles using Marvin Charles had completed his PhD research hydrodynamic chromatography and on the rheology in rheology at Brooklyn Polytechnic Institute when and coagulation of colloidal suspensions. Cesar's he came in 1970. He joined forces with Bob Coughlin, basic research on separation and dispersion now at Connecticut, and developed what would be the mechanisms has generated new analytical methods initial roots of the biotechnology effort at Lehigh. that are now used commercially. Andy, who did his While maintaining a New Yorker's attitude, Marvin doctoral work at North Carolina State, left research worries, in his words, about "identifying problems in­ at GAF for Lehigh. Andy's research interests are in hibiting development and scale up of bioprocesses and the morphology of emulsion polymers and scale up of solving them by understanding the basic biochemical mixing processes in colloidal systems. He is also in­ and engineering concepts." volved in the study of membranes with reduced gas John C. Chen, our current department chairman, permeability. left a successful career at Brookhaven National Labs Rapid changes took place in the eighties. Arthur to join the Mechanical Engineering Department in E. Humphrey and Janice A. Phillips came in 1980 1970. John came to this department in 1980 as the from the University of Pennsylvania. Art, a former Carl R. Anderson Professor of Chemical Engineering. student of Elmer Gaden at Columbia and Dean of En­ His original interests in heat transfer, started at gineering at Penn, became Lehigh's provost. A Michigan where he worked under S.W. Churchill, member of the National Academy of Engineering, he have cut a wide swath in radiation and multiphase pioneered the field of biochemical engineering with processes. He has maintained a core activity in con­ his well-known textbook, written with Aiba, being one vective boiling, but heat transfer in circulating and of the first to link traditional fermentation technology bubbling fluidized beds and the cooling of electronic with modern chemical engineering science. Having re­ circuits are also a significant part of his current in­ turned full time to the department as the T.L. Dia­ terests. John's research contributions have been rec­ mond Professor of Chemical Engineering, Art now ognized by both the AIChE and the ASME, with the leads the Center of Molecular Biology and Biotechnol­ Melville Medal and the Kern Award, respectively. ogy. Art is interested in the "basics": fermenta­ Mohamed S. El-Aasser studied under Stan Mason tion modeling, monitoring and control, the new plas­ at McGill and came to Lehigh in 1970. Together with mid stability and plant cell culture; and in the John Vanderhoff and Gary Poehlein, now at Georgia "applied": waste water treatment and waste utiliza­ Tech, Mohamed was instrumental in the development tion. Students should be aware that graduate work of the Emulsion Polymers Institute and is currently with Art includes strenuous hiking about his mountain its co-director. He is concerned with the formation, retreat in northern Pennsylvania. Janice, an avid run­ stability, and polymerization of mini-emulsions and ner and a former student of Art Humphrey at Penn, the morphology of composite latex particles. With his coordinates the graduate activities of the department co-workers, Mohamed was involved in the preparation and directs the Bioprocessing Institute. Her three key of large monodisperse latex particles in the micrograv­ research areas are the use of Fourier Transform In­ ity environment of the space shuttle. More recently frared Spectroscopy for continuous monitoring of fer­ he has become interested in the surface modification mentations, the chemical engineering of mammalian of latexes and their new intriguing applications in the cell technology, and enzyme engineering. The FTIR

62 CHEMICAL ENGINEERING EDU CATION work requires the use of statistical methods to extract information on concentration of the desired compo­ The only ce rta inty about the future is that it will be nents against the noisy backdrop provided by the challenging ... our emphasis on the fundamentals of water spectrum. The mammalian cell work studies the education, combined w ith opportunities to experience environmental factors controlling the productivity of a pplied engineering as w ell as innovative research, will be of long-lasting benefit to our students. mammalian cell cultures. Janice is not only an active research scientist (PYI awardee), but also an excel­ lent teacher, receiving the university's Robinson Award in 1983. chromatographic methods. More recently Jim has also While Matthew J. Reilly's main activities are in become involved in vaccine technology. Israel brings the development of research programs at the univer­ into the department the tools of modern surface sci­ sity level, he actively participates in the teaching of ence. After PhD work under Robert Maddix at Stan­ undergraduate design courses and assists in the ford, he joined Exxon Research before coming to supervision of graduate students in process modeling. Lehigh in 1987. He has used, among other techniques, A student of Roger Schmitz at Illinois, and a former Raman spectra to elucidate the character of surface faculty member at Carnegie-Mellon, Matt occupied oxides on substrates that are finding increasing appli­ several positions with the National Academy of En­ cations for metal oxide catalysts, ceramic materials, gineering and the federal energy research program pigments, and electronic devices. before coming to Lehigh in 1982. Important contributions to the depatmental oper­ ations are made also by Phillip A. Blythe and Eric Christos Georgakis, another Minnesota student P. Salathe, who hold joint appointments in mechani­ (having studied with Aris-Amundson) joined the de­ cal engineering and mathematics, respectively. Phillip partment in 1983. His research interests in process works in diffusion and reaction and in the fluid control synergized with Bill Luyben's and blossomed mechanics of melts used in the production of semicon­ into an University-Industry NSF Research Center for ductor devices. Eric is interested in microcirculation Process Modeling and Control. For all of the industrial and in biomechanics. We could not close this descrip­ support, Christos' research remains thoroughly basic. tion without mentioning William R. Hencke. Bill was He is interested in nonlinear and multivariable control associate laboratory director at Texaco and his experi­ and in the more exploratory tendency and expert con­ ence has been invaluable in the modernization of the trol. Less traditional projects involve plant-wide con­ Unit Operations Laboratory, the teaching of the pro­ trol and statistical quality control in chemical proces­ fessional development courses, and in the advising of ses. both graduate and undergraduate students. Harvey G. Stenger studied under Charles Satter­ field at MIT and joined Lehigh in 1984. Harvey's in­ THE FUTURE terests are in reaction engineering. He is working on a variety of heterogeneous reacting systems, includ­ The only certainty about the future is that it will ing the processing of electronic materials, the use of be challenging, both for our students and for our fac­ layered catalysts for NOx and sulfur removal in com­ ulty. We feel that our emphasis on the fundamentals bustion gases, and the modeling of food processes such of education, combined with opportunities to experi­ as the semibatch alkalinization of cacao products. Har­ ence applied engineering as well as innovative re­ vey was given Lehigh's Robinson Award as the out­ search, will be of long-lasting benefit to our students, standing teacher in 1988 and currently chairs the de­ both graduate and undergraduate. We think that the partment's Undergraduate Affairs Committee. Last, four areas of research selected for special attention by but not least, he contributes a solid batting average the faculty (polymers, biotechnology, multi-phase pro­ to the departmental softball team. cessing, and process modeling/control) are among the The last three years have seen the addition of most significant and fertile in the broad spectrum of James T. Hsu and Israel E. Wachs. Jim had exten­ chemical engineering. Above all, we are convinced sive industrial experience in separations and catalysis that the attention paid to engineering science will per­ and after doctoral work with Joshua Dranoff at North­ mit our department to respond to evolving technolog­ western, came to Lehigh from Gulf Research and the ical challenges. As a department our collective objec­ NSF in 1986. His current research on bioseparations tive is to give our students the very best possible edu­ concentrates on the use of aqueous two-phase polymer cation and to contribute significantly to the advance­ systems, and on selective precipitation and ment of chemical engineering science and practice. D

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