Bachelor of Science - Chemical Engineering

Chemical engineers have long played key roles in a diverse set of industries that include petroleum, food, pharmaceuticals, artificial fibers, petrochemicals, plastics and ceramics. In these areas, chemical engineers design and develop the processes for large-scale manufacturing that result in affordable products that are essential to modern life.

Chemical engineers are on the forefront of rapidly developing areas that include biotechnology and biomedicine, semiconductor manufacturing and data storage devices, and advanced materials with precisely-controlled microstructures. Chemical engineering is also widely applied to environmental protection and remediation, process safety, and hazardous waste management.

The chemical engineering course of study at UNM offers broad training in the fundamentals of mathematics, physics, chemistry, and the engineering sciences. These are integrated with the chemical engineering "core," which includes thermodynamics; heat, momentum, and mass transport; chemical reaction engineering; design; and process control.

For juniors and seniors, opportunities exist for research projects with individual faculty in their laboratories. The range of projects includes such things as catalysis, biotechnology, semiconductor manufacturing, chemical vapor deposition, and plasma etching. Students undertaking individual projects gain exposure to state of the art processing and analytical equipment, including aerosol, chemical vapor deposition, and plasma reactors; ellipsometry; scanning electron microscopy; Auger spectroscopy; and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy.