Chemical Engineering (LGPM) - EA 4038

Research fields

The Department has two principal interrelated axes of interest, namely, Process Engineering and the study of Materials. Key words for the activities of this Department include: Modelling, simulation and experimentation. These activities are encountered as a common thread in all the activities of the Department (LGPM).

The complementary nature of the Department’s activities permit, the application of the knowledge of microscopic phenomena, to the construction of models, their simulation and finally to the optimisation and intensification of the various processes under study. Our particular know-how and competence is the application of the “sustainability” aspects (e.g. use of renewable materials, economy of materials and energy) of processes in general to bioprocesses. These Departmental competences have been strengthened by the participation of the Department in the creation of a Centre of Excellence for White Biotechnology (CEBB) at the end of 2010, permitting full-time employment of three Professors and an Engineer.

The Department consists of three Teams on the basis of their areas of activity:

Materials and Biomaterials

• Metals, wood and natural fibres
• Development and transformation processes
• Tribocorrosion

Chemistry and separative processes

• Liquid-liquid extraction and extraction using emulsions
• Particle transport and deposition
• Analytical and preparative chromatography

Bioprocesses

• Studying physicochemical and biological processes
• Modeling at multiple scales
• Application of control-command strategies for bioreactors
• The use of microalgae to capture CO2 and/or to treat sewage. Anaerobic digestion and methane generation
• Production and purification of desired molecules

Applications

• Biomass, white biotechnology, materials characterisation and development, energy, environment, chemical and pharmaceutical industries, photovoltaic energy generation, water treatment, hydrometallurgy.

Dedicated equipment:

• Analyses and characterisation: Spectrophotometers (elemental analysis, ICP-AES, UV, IR, atomic absorption, fluorescence X), chromatographs, SEM + EDS, environmental ESEM, interferometric microscopy, microptopograph, tribocorrosimetre, thermobalance coupled DSC, calorimetric detection of biological activity, DMA, mass diffusion, permeability measurements, sorption isotherms, laser granulometer, tensiometer by drop method, particle image velocity PIV, deformation by image correlation.

Methods:

• Liquid-liquid extraction, preparative gas and liquid chromatography, ultra- and nano- filtration, reverse osmosis, photo-bioreactors, drying, thermal treatment, high temperature milling, surface treatments.

Modeling/simulation:

• Modeling/simulation: direct simulation of deep-bed filtration, multi-scale modeling of coupled transfer in porous media, multiphysics modelling, meskless methods (LB, MPM), bioprocesses modeling.