Chemical Engineering Focuses Increasingly on the Biological

Abstract

Since the beginnings of chemical engineering in the late 19th century, traditional concerns of the field have focused on areas such as petroleum refining and production of industrial chemicals, plastics, and such consumer products as synthetic detergents. Most chemical engineers still work in these areas today. But in the past 15 20 years chemical engineering has increasingly developed a life sciences orientation as well. This biological side of chemical engineering was underscored in December at a meeting in Washington, D.C., on Research Opportunities in Biomolecular Engineering: The Interface between Chemical Engineering and Biology. The meeting was sponsored by the National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIGMS), a unit of the National Institutes of Health, and cochaired by chemical engineering professor George S. Georgiou of the University of Texas, Austin, and health sciences administrator Irene B. Glowinski of NIGMS. The purpose of the meeting, says Glowinski, was to highlight the resea...