Arvind Varma

Heterogeneous catalysis is widely used in chemical, refinery, and pollution-control processes. For this reason, achieving optimal performance of catalysts is a significant issue for chemical engineers and chemists. This book addresses the question of how catalytic material should be distributed inside a porous support in order to obtain optimal performance. It treats single and multiple reaction systems, isothermal and nonisothermal conditions, pellets, monoliths, fixed-bed reactors, and membrane reactors. The effects of physicochemical and operating parameters are analyzed to gain insight into the underlying phenomena governing the performance of optimally designed catalysts. Throughout, the authors offer a balanced treatment of theory and experiment. Particular attention is given to problems of commercial importance. With its thorough treatment of the design, preparation, and utilization of supported catalysts, this book will be an ideal resource for graduate students, researchers, and practising engineers and chemists.

The behavior of a chemical system is affected by many physicochemical parameters. The sensitivity of the system's behavior to changes in parameters is known as parametric sensitivity. When a system operates in a parametrically sensitive region, its performance becomes unreliable and changes sharply with small variations in parameters. Thus, it would be of great value to predict sensitivity behavior in chemical systems. This book is the first to provide a thorough treatment of the concept of parametric sensitivity and the mathematical tool it generated, sensitivity analysis. The emphasis is on applications to real situations. The book begins with definitions of various sensitivity indices and describes the numerical techniques used for their evaluation. Extensively illustrated chapters discuss sensitivity analysis in a variety of chemical reactors - batch, tubular, continuous-flow, fixed-bed - and in combustion systems, air pollution, and metabolic processes. Chemical engineers, chemists, graduate students, and researchers will welcome this valuable resource.

Designed to provide a firm grounding in mathematical methods for chemical engineering practitioners in academic institutions and industry, this volume builds on the reader's previous knowledge of calculus, differential equations and linear algebra. Varma and Morbidelli offer an integrated treatment of linear operator theory from determinants through partial differential equations, and feature extensive chapters on both ordinary differential equations and perturbation methods. Numerous high-quality diagrams and examples from chemical engineering illustrate the textual material and enhance the reader's understanding of complex mathematical systems.