General Information:

·         Syllabus and Course Goals

·         ABET-Related Objectives, Outcomes, and Assessments 

·         Statement on Academic Integrity

Brief Lecture Summaries with Course Handouts and Links to Relevant Websites:

·         Lecture 1: Basic Concepts

·         Lecture 2: Numerical Methods

·         Lecture 3: Use of Excel and Matlab for Numerical Computations

·         Lecture 4: Thermodynamics of Phase Equilibrium

·         Lecture 5a: Single-Stage Equilibrium Processes

·         Lecture 5b: Introduction to ChemSep and Aspen

·         Lecture 6: Staging of Separation Processes

·         Lecture 7: Binary Distillation

·         Lecture 8: Multicomponent Distillation

·         Lecture 9: Absorption, Stripping, and Extraction

·         Lecture 10: Capacity and Stage Efficiency

·         Lecture 11: Continuous Contactors

·         Lecture 12:  Membrane Processes

·         Lecture 13:  Adsorption and Chromatography

·         Lecture 14:  Spray Drying, Freeze Drying, and Lyophilization

·         Lecture 15:  Selection of Separation Processes

·         Lecture 16: Selection of Solvents for Solvent Extraction  

Tutorials:  

    Tutorials on Distillation, Absorption, Stripping, and Related Processes:

·          Distillation: An Introduction This tutorial was developed by Ming Tham at Newcastle University.

·          Thermodynamics and Distillation Tutorials from Newcastle University These basic tutorials were also developed by Ming Tham. 

·          Distillation Tutorials by Angelo Lucia  This very good set of tutorials was developed by Angelo Lucia at the Univeristy of Rhode Island and includes some nice graphics which illlustrate important concepts.

·          APV Handbook on Distillation  An excellent summary of the industrial perspective on distillation technology

·          Design Steam Strippers for Water Treatment   An excellent review of wastewater treatment using steam stripping written by Jose Bravo. This article appeared in Chemical Engineering Progress (vol. 90(12), 56-63, Dec. 1994) and is provided courtesy of the Separations Division of AIChE

·          Solve wastewater problems with liquid-liquid extraction   This article from Chemical Engineering Progress (vol. 92(4), 56-63, April, 1996) on wastewater treatment using liquid extraction was written by Roger Cusak and is provided courtesy of the Separations division of AIChE

    Tutorials on Steam Heating, Reboilers, Heat Exchangers, and Steam Traps:

·          Steam Heating and Steam Traps This very practical guide is from ITT Industries.

·          Operation of Thermosiphon Reboilers  This tutorial comes from the plant design course taught by Daniel Lewin at Technion

·         Heat Exchanger Design  This tutorial also comes from the plant design course taught by Daniel Lewin at Technion

    Tutorials on the Description Rule:

·        The Description Rule Taken from Chapter 1 of “Computation of Multistage Separation Processes” by Donald N. Hanson, John H. Duffin, and Graham F. Somerville

    Tutorial on Experienced-Based Rules in Chemical Engineering:

·        Experienced-Based Rules in Chemical Engineering.  This article, which comes from the Cheresources.com website, summarizes many "rules of thumb" in the area of chemical process design, including the design of separation processes. It is a summary of the contents of the textbooks on this subject by S. M. Walas, Richard Turton, Carl R. Branan, and Christopher Haslego. The content of this article is also available in a very handy Excel spreadsheet which you can obtain here.

    Tutorials on Adsorption and Ion Exchange:

·          Adsorbent Selection from Adsorption Research Inc.

·         Adsorber Design form Adsorption Research Inc.

·         Ion Exchange Basics from Remco Engineering

    Tutorials on Drying, Evaporation, and Lyophilization:

·         APV Handbook on Drying

·         APV Handbook on Evaporation

·         Freeze Drying and Lyophilization

    Tutorials on Bioseparations:

·        Electrophoresis Tutorial from San Diego State University

·        Centrifugation Tutorial from San Diego State University

·        Basic Liquid Chromatography On-line Textbook  

    Tutorials on Software:

·         Tutorial on solving systems of ODEs using Excel

·         MS Excel Solver tutorial

·         Library of MATLAB tutorials at LSU

·         MATLAB tutorial at the University of Florida

    Tutorials on Problem Solving:

·         Thoughts on Problem Solving  Need inspiration?  Try this

Websites for Companies Involved in Separation Processes:

·         ACS Separations and Mass-Transfer Products  Column packings for absorbers and strippers.

·         APV Separation Processes  Evaporation, drying, distillation, and membrane filtration in the dairy, food, chemical and pharmaceutical industries.

·         Applied Separations Inc.  Supercritical fluid and pressurized solvent extraction systems.

·         Danish Separation Systems (DSS)  Membrane technology and processes.

·         GEA Process Engineering Inc.  Spray drying, membrane filtration, evaporation.

·         Hydranautics Inc. Membranes

·         Jaeger Produces Tower Packings and Column Internals  Lots of technical information on column packings for absorbers, strippers, and distillation columns.

·         Koch Modular Process Systems Distillation, extraction, absorption and stripping processes.  The section on Past Projects has lots of pictures of industrial equipment.

·         Koch-Glitsch, Inc. Packed tower internals, structured packings, random packings, and trays for absorbers, strippers, and distillation columns.  Try out their free column design software.

·         Lantec Products Inc.  Tower packings for absorbers, strippers, and distillation columns.  The section on Case Histories has some interesting discussions of projects.

·         Lanxess Ion Exchange Resins

·         PCI Membrane Systems, Inc.  Microfiltration, ultrafiltration, nanofiltration, and reverse osmosis systems

·         Purolite Inc.: Ion Exchange Resins.

·         Remco Engineering: Water and wastwater treatment systems Lots of  information on ion exchange, reverse osmosis, and ultrafiltration processes.

·         ResinTech: Manufacturer of Ion Exchange Resins, Activated Carbon, and Selective Ion Exchange Media

·         Sulzer Chemtech  Packings and trays for columns, fractional crystallization, pervaporation processes.  They also have free design software.

·         SX Kinetics Inc. - Specialists in Solvent Extraction

Databases and Libraries:

·         Cheresources.com This is a link to the Separation Technologies portion of the process design articles part of the Chemical Engineers Resource Page website. You can scroll up and down to see other useful process design articles.

·         Links to Chromatography Websites

·         Thermodynamic Data and Properties Calculation Sites on the Web

·         NIST Chemistry WebBook. This useful database contains thermodynamic properties for over 7000 organic and inorganic species.

·         DIPPR Student Chemical Database

·         AIChE Separations Division   This site contains articles from Chemical Engineering Progress on distillation, absorption, membrane processes, adsorption, crystallization, and other separation processes

Useful Free Software

·         ChemSep-LITE.   This free version of ChemSep, called ChemSep-LITE, simulates multicomponent distillation, absorption, stripping, liquid-liquid extraction, and single-stage flash processes and was developed by Ross Taylor at Clarkson University and Harry Kooijman at Shell Global Solutions International. Be sure to also look at the rest of the ChemSep website, which contains lots of interesting information.

·         COCO.   This free chemical process flowsheet simulation environment is compatible with ChemSep-LITE and contains many features.

·          Octave.  An open-source free MATLAB clone originally developed at the University of Wisconsin

·         EASY-FIT and EASY-OPT.   These programs for nonlinear optimization and data fitting are available for free from the website of Professor Klaus Schittkowski at the University of Bayreuth.  

·         CADIX.  This computer-assisted design software for ion exchange processes was developed by DOW.

·         Pressure Swing Adsorption Calculator.   This software for designing pressure swing adsorption processes was developed by James Ritter at the University of South Carolina.

·         Membrane Process Simulator.    This software was developed by Benny Freeman at the University of Texas.

·         Adsorption and Chromatography Software.   This website contains several Visual BASIC programs and MS Excel spreadsheets for adsorption and chromatography that were developed by John Hubble at the University of Bath. This software employs the tanks in series model.

·         FreeCalc.com.  Assorted online calculators for engineering problems.   

·         Dynamic Simulation of Multicomponent Distillation.  An Excel spreadsheet developed by Douglas Frey at UMBC which simulates the time-dependent approach to steady state of a multicomponent distillation column when the plate compositions are initially set at arbitrary values.  This software also provides a convenient way to solve the multicomponent steady-state "operating problem" by simulating the approach to steady state.

·        Professor Klaus Schittkowski at the University of Bayreuth   This website deals with numerical nonlinear optimization and includes some useful free software.

·        Advanced Separation Processes Course at the Technical University of Denmark   This excellent course website was developed by Rafiqul Gani and includes PowerPoint lectures and tutorials.

·        Professor William R. Wilcox at Clarkson University   The Online Educational Materials Section of this website contains a link entitled Chemical Engineering Plant Design Information and Advice. If you go to that webpage, you will find many useful additional links concerned with process design, including links to many useful on-line books on this subject at the Knovel Books website which you can access if you are a member (including a student member) of AIChE.

·        Separation Processes Course at Newcastle University

·        Separation Processes Course at MIT   The "Exams" and "Assignments" sections of this MIT course website contain some useful practice problems.

Online Books for Fun

·         The Art of Distillation  This book is a little old.  Actually, it was originally published in the year 1651 by the alchemist John French.

·         The Home Distillation Handbook  For the home hobbyist.  But be careful, the procedures described in this book are illegal to do in the U.S.

Photographs

·         Fall 2007: Class photograph

·         Fall 2008: Class photograph

·         Fall 2008: Class trip to Millennium Inorganic Chemicals

·         Spring 2009: Class trip to GenVec

·         Fall 2009: Class photograph

·         Fall 2009: Class trip to Pompeian Oils

·         Fall 2010: Class photograph

·         Fall 2011: Class photograph

·         Fall 2011: Class trip to Diageo