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Sharing your expertise

| By Dorothy Lozowski, Editor in Chief

Chemical engineers can put their skills to use in a very broad range of areas — from chemical and pharmaceutical manufacturing to petroleum refining and to areas of biomedical work, such as development of artificial dialysis equipment and more. This versatility is, in part, what drew me to study chemical engineering. In the great diversity of jobs that we hold — whether concentrating in plant operations, design, safety, research and development, management, procurement, technical services and many combinations of these jobs — what ties us all together is the discipline of chemical engineering. The basic building blocks that we have learned in heat-and-mass transfer, material balances, separations, reaction kinetics, cost engineering and more, whether in the classroom or on the job, are what chemical engineers have in common.

 

Building knowledge

With work experience comes practical knowledge of how to apply the basic building blocks of our profession. Engineers gain great on-the-job expertise in the areas in which they work. As most engineers are multi-taskers, holding a wide variety of jobs, sharing that expertise is most beneficial. Experienced engineers can learn about areas that they may not have concentrated in, but need to know about. New graduates can benefit from the practical knowledge they will need as they embark upon their careers.

There are a number of ways to share that expertise, one of which is to write an article for publication. Chemical Engineering seeks manuscripts written by experts in the field to serve our readers. If you might be interested in writing such a manuscript, please read on.

 

What we seek

The main thing we look for in our outside-authored articles is practical information. Our readers want factual information that can be applied to their jobs. Next, our articles should appeal to a relatively wide section of our readers, who as mentioned earlier, are in diverse fields within the chemical process industries (CPI). While specific applications may be useful to illustrate a point, an article should have a broad appeal. These articles should also show no favoritism to specific products or vendors. And, a last point to keep in mind is that the article should not have been published elsewhere.

We cover a wide variety of topics ranging from highly technical areas to professional development. If you have an idea for an article that you think would be a fit for Chemical Engineering, we encourage you to contact us ([email protected]). Our editors can help with any questions you might have, and help guide you in producing a manuscript for a promising topic.

 

Inside this issue

Our December issue brings the news of our 2015 Kirkpatrick Award winner and covers the breakthrough technologies of all five finalists in this biennial competition (pp. 16–20). Cost estimating is the subject of our two-part cover story (pp. 36–44) and other highlighted topics in this hefty issue include: point-level switches; process hazard analyses; plant revamps; and of course our annual Buyer’s Guide. We hope you enjoy it.■

ed  Dorothy Lozowski, Editor in Chief