CAPEC-PROCESS Annual Meeting 2012

Participants from all over the world gathered at DTU and Tivoli Hotel & Congress Centre to share new knowledge and groundbreaking data, and to forge new collaboration and professional relations. Amongst the industrial members were both founding members and members who were attending for the first time.

When asked about their output and expectations to the Annual Meeting and Consortium membership, industrial members in unison stressed the importance of gaining access to latest research data, interesting and internationally minded people and excellent modelling tools. Members also pointed out that DTU and the CAPEC and PROCESS centres deliver good education and attract good students.

Dr. Martin Guinn of Pfizer Inc, the world’s largest pharmaceutical company, was attending for the first time – as Pfizer has just decided to join the Industrial Consortium.   Martin pointed out that the main reasons to join were the access to CAPEC’s modelling tools, which  - compared to commercial vendors are inexpensive - and compared to other universities are superior.   Martin was also pleasantly surprised with the membership fee, which he found great value for money.     Photo: Dr. Martin Guinn, Director of Engineering and Process Safety  at Pfizer.

Photo: Dr. Hiroaki Nakata of Mitsubishi Chemical Group, Japan was amongst the keynote speakers

Dr. Nakata was back in Copenhagen representing one of the founding members of the Industrial Consortium – Mitsubishi Chemical Group who together with CAPEC and others established the consortium in 1997.   The main purpose for his membership is CAPEC’s software which has a very nice user interface and is competitive compared to commercial software, which is very expensive. For Mitsubishi, it would take a long time to develop their own software – and thus the CAPEC tools offer a very attractive alternative.   Dr. Nakata also found great interest in the company presentations as he finds it interesting to see what European companies are doing. He believes that it is important for Japan to go abroad, mainly to Europe, and compare itself to European technology which he finds “at the top compared to others”.   The networking at the meeting also opens new doors to meet other companies and forge new relations.

Dr. Manfred Heilig of BASF Germany, the world's leading chemical company, was amongst the keynote speakers and a well-known member after 10 years’ membership.   Dr. Heilig explained that BASF originally joined because they had seen the publications of Professor Rafiqul Gani. BASF’s reasons of membership also included their focus on physical property data, the research work done at CAPEC and the interesting people; including PhD students. The latter Dr. Heilig ascribed to Professor Gani’s ability to attract good people – and giving them a good education at the centre. Over the years, BASF has employed two CAPEC PhD students.   BASF mainly takes part in the consortium because of its relationship to CAPEC and their collaboration – a collaboration that Dr. Heilig would like to intensify.   Finally, Dr. Heilig pointed out that BASF is a company of many specialists, and that CAPEC delivers an attractive and broad spectrum of research – which can bring value and inspiration to BASF over a wide range of issues.

Photo: Dr. Manfred Heilig of BASF Germany

Photo: Bent Sarup, General Manager at Alfa Laval, Copenhagen Denmark

When Bent Sarup started at Alfa Laval, one of his first actions was to establish collaboration with DTU Chemical Engineering – as Bent had already had many years of collaboration with the department through his former employer, Haldor Topsøe. Bent believed that Alfa Laval could benefit from such a collaboration – and in Bent Sarup’s current area of work, vegetable oils and biodiesel, the interest is mainly in tools and methods. The tools were missing when Bent joined Alfa Laval, and now these tools have been co-developed with CAPEC.   Collaboration with DTU Chemical Engineering has grown from a few master students, over PhD students, to joint EU-financed development programmes. Currently, 4-5 PhD students work in the area relevant to Alfa Laval – and the results are used in Alfa Laval. “Already today, it is to our benefit – commercially”, Bent Sarup states.   Contact with CAPEC is on a weekly basis, and Bent takes part in the Annual Meeting to get a “360 degree picture of what happens at CAPEC” – “and now and again you get an eye opener and think, how can we use this in our company?”, Bent concludes.

Former CAPEC student and new industrial member

Dr. Elisa Conte was a very well-known face to the CAPEC and PROCESS researchers – as Elisa is a former CAPEC graduate. Elisa took her PhD at CAPEC DTU Chemical Engineering in 2007-2010. Professor Gani was her supervisor and the reason she decided to study at DTU in Denmark. Her MSc supervisor in Italy simply stated that Professor Gani is the best in Europe.   Elisa very much enjoyed studying at DTU and appreciated the international environment in CAPEC. To do your PhD in such a place really opens up your mind. Before joining Akzo Nobel in the Netherlands, Elisa worked as a postdoc on a joint CAPEC / Akzo Nobel project.   Elisa constantly draws on her skills and experiences obtained in CAPEC for her research work in Akzo Nobel. She is very happy to be back in Denmark with known CAPEC people – and is also on the lookout for new collaboration. Now her focus has changed and become broader, in the sense that every kind of research input is interesting – both for her specialized area and Akzo Nobel’s broad palette of research and production.

Photo: Dr. Elisa Conte of Akzo Nobel and former CAPEC graduate

Qi Chen and Brianna Christian were attending for the first time, as visiting students from the University of Kansas. Qi and Brianna are part of a joint research project between DTU CAPEC and the University of Kansas.

Another member of Qi and Brianna’s research group attended last year and had such a good experience that he encouraged Qi and Brianna to go this year.   Qi and Brianna are participating to be part of the experience, hear news from the research group and get the bigger picture of the joint research with CAPEC and PROCESS. Qi is much into the programming, while Brianna is the go-between and as she states “tells Qi what he should program”. The aim of their research project is to overcome the challenges of seperating two compounds from an azeotropic mixture, as in e.g. seperating an unwanted compound from a drug.   Qi, who is in his third year of undergraduate studies, finds it especially interesting to get an insight into all the other projects presented at the meeting. Brianna has just graduated and will start her PhD in the fall – and expects to meet many CAPEC and PROCESS researchers through AIChE.   Photo: Brianna Chrisitan and Qi Chen, visiting students from the University of Kansas

Larissa Cunico started as PhD student in CAPEC on 1 February 2012 and comes from Brazil. At the Annual Meeting, Larissa presented her research on Modelling of phase equilibria and related properties of mixtures involving lipids in a poster session.   Contact to CAPEC and DTU was established by her supervisor in Brazil who has previously worked with Professor Gani and met with him at conferences.   Larissa finds DTU a good university and would like to stay on after her PhD, perhaps as a postdoc at CAPEC. She finds it easy to adapt to her new country, as the environment is very open – not least in an environment of many international students and researchers.   Her research at CAPEC is combined with experimental work in Brazil.

Photo: Larissa Cunico, new PhD student at CAPEC

 

For further information, please contact Professor Rafiqul Gani,