Región Alcanzable Como Herramienta En La Enseñanza Del Diseño De Reactores

Chemical Engineering 258 Education
Ask a graduating chemical engineering student the following
question: What makes one reactor different
from the next? The answers received will often be
unsatisfactory and vary widely in scope. Some may cite the
difference between the basic design equations, others may
point out a PFR is “longer,” and still others may state that it
all depends on theparticular reaction network. Though these
answers do possess a bit of truth, they do not capture the true
difference between reactors: the degree of mixing achieved.
This is the inherent difficulty with teaching chemical reaction
engineering. The students learn the technical skills required
to perform the calculations to determine maximum yields and
shortest space-times, but very rarely are theyable to grasp and
thoroughly understand the theory and underlying differences
between reactors.[1] Often, too much time is devoted to tedious
and involved calculations to determine the correct answer on
homework instead of focusing on the concepts to enforce the
benefits offered by each reactor presented.
Reactor network optimization is traditionally not covered
in any depth at theundergraduate level.[2-4] The way reactor
network optimization is traditionally taught to graduate students
often involves large numbers of coupled equations that
can sometimes hide the final goal of the analysis. Attempts
Teaching Reaction Engineering
Using the Att ainable Region
Matthew J. Metzger, Benjamin J. Glasser
Rutgers University • Piscataway, NJ 08854
David Glasser, Brendon Hausberger,and Diane Hildebrandt
University of the Witwatersrand • WITS, 2050 Johannesburg, South Africa
Matthew Metzger is pursuing his Ph.D. at Rutgers University. He received
his B.S. from Lafayette College and spent two summers working with the
chemical engineering department at the University of the Witwatersrand.
His interests lie in applying the attainable region approach to particle
processingin the pharmaceutical field.
Benjamin J. Glasser is an associate professor of chemical and biochemical
engineering at Rutgers University. He has earned degrees in
chemical engineering from the University of the Witwatersrand (B.S.,
M.S.) and Princeton University (Ph.D.). His research interests include
granular flows, gas-particle flows, multiphase reactors, and nonlinear
dynamics oftransport processes.
Diane Hildebrandt is the co-founder of COMPS at the University of
the Witwatersrand. She received her B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. from the
University of the Witwatersrand, and currently leads the academic and
consultant research teams at the university. She has published more than
50 refereed-journal articles on topics ranging from process synthesis to
thermodynamics.
BrendonHausberger is a director at the Centre of Material and Process
Synthesis (COMPS) at the University of the Witwatersrand. He received
his B.S. and Ph.D. from the University of the Witwatersrand, and is currently
overseeing the launch of Fischer-Tropschs plants in both China
and Australia.
David Glasser is a director of the Centre of Material and Process Synthesis
at the University of theWitwatersrand. He is acknowledged as a
world-leading researcher in the field of reactor and process optimization,
and is a NRF A1 rated researcher. His extensive publication record and
research areas extend from reactor design and optimization to distillation
and process optimization and intensification.
© Copyright ChE Division of ASEE 2007
ChE curriculum
Vol. 41, No. 4, Fall 2007 259
to simplifythe situation, such as Levenspiel’s graphical
analysis,[4] do offer some benefit, however their applicability
is limited as they can readily only optimize simple reaction
problems. For chemical engineers, it is paramount to know
the most promising solution to a real problem in the shortest
amount of time, and rarely is this accomplished with the current
teaching methods for reactor network...