The Department of Chemical Engineering at IIT Madras boasts a large number of cutting-edge laboratories and centers for research. The labs, jointly operated by faculty and students, conduct research pertaining both to academic as well as industrial applications. During the course of their academic tenure, students cover numerous lab courses to get hands-on experience in the field.
Let’s have a brief look at some of the labs:
- Process Control and Instrumentation Lab: This lab focuses on research and development of modern control strategies for chemical processes as well as design of instrumentation systems.
- Chemical Reaction Engineering Lab: Research done in this lab involves investigation and optimization of chemical reactions, reactors and kinetics.
- Fluid Mechanics Lab: This lab explores the various behaviors of fluids and their interactions with each other. It makes use of experimental as well as computational techniques to collate data on fluid dynamic parameters like pressure, flow, viscosity, etc.
- Heat Transfer Lab: This lab’s focus primarily revolves around the various heat transfer phenomena—namely conduction, convection and radiation—and their applications in various industrial processes.
- Catalysis and Reaction Engineering Lab: This lab specializes in studying catalytic processes and their use in optimization of chemical kinetics and yield.
- Polymers and Rheology Lab: This lab studies the properties and behavior of polymers, including their synthesis, reactivity, characterization and rheological properties.
- Environmental Engineering Lab: This lab mainly focuses on energy conservation, storage and optimization. It also works on offering renewable alternatives to conventional sources of energy.
- Computational Fluid Dynamics Lab: This lab develops computational techniques for simulation and analysis of fluid flow, heat transfer, and chemical interactions, without the need of any physical experimentation.