Welcome From The Chair

Message From The Director of Graduate Admissions

Degree Requirements

The Department of Chemical Engineering requires that applicants for admission have a B.S. in Chemical Engineering or a related field from a program meeting ABET requirements. During the first two semesters in residence, a student entering with a chemical engineering degree will take courses distributed among main areas of chemical engineering science, 2 credit hours of graduate seminar, with additional hours of thesis research. At the end of the first year, the student presents written and oral reports based on the thesis research. These reports, together with performance in course work and teaching assistant duties, constitute the Comprehensive Evaluation and permit the student to continue working towards the student's degree objective.

Master of Science in Chemical Engineering

The Master's of Science degree, with thesis, requires 15 credit hours of graduate course work (5 courses) with a minimum 3.0 grade point average, and 15 credit hours of thesis research and graduate seminar. The results of the research are presented as a Master's thesis and defended in a final oral defense. Full-time students with a background in chemical engineering ordinarily complete these requirements in 16 to 24 months.

Doctor of Philosophy in Chemical Engineering

The Ph.D. degree requires 30 credit hours of graduate course work (10 courses) with a minimum 3.3 grade point average, and 42 hours of thesis research and graduate seminar. Students entering with a M.S. degree, earned within five years of admission and from a recognized graduate institution, may transfer up to 24 credit hours provided that the transferred credits satisfy departmental guidelines for course work distribution and grade point average.

The student is admitted to Ph.D. Degree Candidacy after completing 48 credit hours and passing the Ph.D. Oral Candidacy Examination. This examination, ordinarily completed during the fifth semester in residence, consists of a written and oral presentation of thesis research to a faculty committee.

After reaching Ph.D. Candidacy, the student devotes essentially all efforts to completing his or her thesis research. The results of the research are presented as a Ph.D. dissertation and orally defended before a faculty committee. In recent years, students with an undergraduate degree in chemical engineering have completed the Ph.D. degree requirements in 4-4.5 years.

There is no foreign language requirement for either the M.S. or Ph.D. degree.