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Honoring the work of Hamielec, Ray, and Cozewith

2018; Wiley; Volume: 12; Issue: 4 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1002/mren.201800033

1862-8338

Robin A. Hutchinson, João B. P. Soares, Jeff Brinen,

Catalysis and Hydrodesulfurization Studies

This issue is a tribute to Charlie Cozewith, Harmon Ray and Archie Hamielec, three of the pioneers in the field of Macromolecular Reaction Engineering whose contributions were recently honored at the 67th Canadian Chemical Engineering Conference held in Edmonton last October. The special symposium was attended by over 50 industrial and academic researchers from around the world (photo below), and featured both technical presentations and personal recollections from their colleagues, including many former students. For those of you who have not had the pleasure of benefiting directly from their advice and mentorship, both technical and personal, we have included brief biographical sketches. The collection of contributions collated for this special issue provide a sampling of how the research community appreciates and continues to build on the strong foundations that Charlie, Harmon and Archie have established. Charles Cozewith obtained his BSc (1959), MSc (1961), and PhD (1965) degrees in Chemical Engineering from Carnegie Mellon University. His PhD thesis, under Professor Kun Li, was on the kinetics of the aluminum-chlorine reaction. After obtaining his MS degree, Dr. Cozewith worked for the Gulf Research and Development Company for 2 years developing catalyst and process technology for oxidation of aromatics before returning to school to obtain a PhD. In 1965, Cozewith joined the Elastomers Research Division of the Exxon Chemical Company to work in the area of Ziegler-Natta catalyzed polymerization of olefins. During his career in Elastomers Research, he carried out a wide range of research projects in polyolefin process and product development, especially for ethylene-propylene elastomers, in positions of increasing responsibility. He was an industry-recognized expert in the area of polyolefin reaction engineering, and is known for his work on copolymerization and reactor modeling. In 1997, Cozewith was promoted to Chief Engineer for Polymer Processes, the highest technical position in ExxonMobil Chemical, and led a group responsible for new developments in polymer reaction engineering for all of ExxonMobil's polymer businesses. He retired in Jan. 2000, after an Exxon career of more than 34 years. Cozewith has authored or co-authored twenty publications on the subjects of reactor modeling, polymer thermodynamics, polymer structure design, and mixing. He has also given numerous invited lectures and conference presentations. He co-chaired the first meeting on polymer reaction engineering sponsored by the Engineering Foundation, and has also co-chaired symposia on this topic at AIChE meetings. Dr. Cozewith has been granted 61 US patents for his inventions in the fields of polyolefin catalysis, processes and products. In 1997 he was a recipient of the Goodyear Corporate Inventor Award. W. Harmon Ray achieved a level of research scholarship and industrial impact during his 37-year teaching and research career that is universally admired. Harmon has made significant contributions to the areas of polymer reactor engineering and modeling, feedback control and state estimation, and particle technology. It is the first topic, sometimes in combination with the other two, that we are celebrating with this special issue. His research combined experimental investigations with first-principle modeling of many types of polymerization, including condensation, emulsion, radical, controlled-radical, and catalyzed olefin chemistries. In many cases, new mathematical strategies had to be developed and applied to capture the complex dynamic behavior of multiphase reactor systems. The research was disseminated widely through The University of Wisconsin Polymerization Reaction Engineering Laboratory (UWPREL) research consortium founded by Harmon in 1983, as well as captured in models contained in the POLYRED software package developed under his leadership. More than 30 companies were members during UWPREL's 20-year history, and the membership reads like the who's who of industrial polymer manufacturers. Harmon has received numerous international and national awards and named professorships during his career, including election into the National Academy of Engineering in 1991, the 1969 Donald P. Eckman Award and 1989 AACC Education Award from the American Automatic Control Council, the 1982 Professional Progress Award from the American Institute of Chemical Engineers, and the Vilas Research Professorship, the most prestigious named professorship at the University of Wisconsin. He initiated an exchange program which brought more than 100 German students to participate in the University of Wisconsin graduate program starting in 1979. In 2000, Harmon received the Richard E. Bellman Award, the lifetime achievement award of the American Automatic Control Council, and in 2006 he received the prestigious Gerhard Damköhler Gold Medal from the German Association of Chemical and Process Engineering. Harmon has also received honorary doctorates from the University of Minnesota (2001) and from the University of Waterloo (2003). Most importantly, he has strongly influenced the next generation of researchers with his professional integrity and high standards. Archie Hamielec received his Bachelor degree in 1957, Master's in 1958 and PhD in 1961, all from the University of Toronto's Chemical Engineering department. He joined McMaster University in 1963 after spending two years in CIL. Although trained in fluid mechanics, Archie became interested in developing and combining knowledge of reaction engineering and polymer chemistry to understand how polymer structure can be controlled. He also quickly realized the importance of polymer characterization, and was the first academic to purchase a gel permeation chromatograph for measurement of polymer molecular weights in 1964. Thus, he is well-recognized as one of the pioneering researches in the field of Polymer Reaction Engineering. Archie has published over 300 refereed journal papers, many becoming classics in the field, covering polymer synthesis and characterization, polymerization kinetics, reaction engineering and modeling, as well as specific applications of polymers. The latter efforts helped companies such as Nalco and SC Johnson commercialize a variety of new products and processes. Archie also enjoyed giving industrial short courses, and, together with Terry Hoffman and John MacGregor, established the McMaster Institute for Polymer Production Technology (MIPPT) in 1982 for which he served as founding director. The Institute attracted a large number of industrial projects and collected considerable funds to expand polymer research from chemical engineering to other departments at McMaster. After retirement in 1993, Archie continued his activities through consulting and as an expert witness. Archie has received much recognition for his research contributions, including CSChE's ERCO Award in 1974, CIC Protection Coatings Award in 1978, NSERC Industrial Chair in Polymer Production Technology in 1986, the CIC-Dunlop Award in Macromolecular Science and Engineering in 1987, and the R.S. Jane Award in 1994. He received an Honorary Doctoral Degree from Waterloo in 1998 and McMaster in 2015, and was elected as a Fellow of Royal Society of Canada (FRSC) in 1987. He supervised and co-supervised 35 PhD, 40 MSc, and numerous postdoctoral fellows during his academic career. Fifteen of his students have become professors and developed strong polymer research programs in their respective universities. Archie believes the three most important things in one's life are: health, wealth, and family, in which he is not only a theoretician but also a practitioner of accomplishment. Robin Hutchinson Queen's University, Canada João Soares University of Alberta, Canada Jeff Brinen ExxonMobil Chemical Company