Welcome

Welcome to the homepage of the research group Fundamentals of Chemical Reaction Engineering (FCRE). The group is part of the Faculty of Science and Technology at the University of Twente in the Netherlands.

The research group FCRE focusses on fundamentals of the discipline of chemical reaction engineering. Our main area of interest is the quantitative description of transport phenomena (including fluid flow) and the interplay with chemical transformations in multiphase chemical reactors.

The generation of new knowledge and the development of new reactor models with improved predictive capability for this industrially important class of chemical reactors constitutes an important goal of our research activities. Through the intended co-operation with other (application oriented) research groups, both fundamental aspects and those closely related to applications are studied through concerted action.

FCRE received European ERC Advanced Grant

November 4th, 2009: Hans Kuipers and his co-workers received a prestigious European ‘ERC Advanced Grant’ of 2.5 million Euros, which will be used to attract some 8 PhD students and for large investments in equipment. This grant allows the group to work on multi-scale modeling of mass and heat transfer in dense gas-solid flows. We will consider integrally the exchange of heat, mass and momentum, and the effects of polydispersity, heterogeneity, and domain geometries, at three levels of modeling, and validated by one-to-one experiments. These generated insight and models will be extremely relevant for the design and scale-up of industrial equipment involving dispersed particulate flow, which is currently a fully empirical process, involving expensive and time-consuming experimentation.

10th anniversary symposium and reunion of FCRE

June 18th, 2009: Last friday, June 12th, the FCRE symposium to honour the 10th anniversary of the group took place. Besides the current employees, also a large number of former PhD-students, Post-Docs and staf members attended this special meeting. Jelle Nieuwland, Bob Hoomans, Albert Bokkers and Joris Smit told about their own research years ago and recalled memories from the time the group was started. For most participants the day was concluded with a good buffet and borrel in the Faculty Club, for others it ended some hours later in the city.

Combined lectures of FCRE and the Physics of Fluids Group

April 3rd, 2009: Although the Physics of Fluids (POF) Group and FCRE are situated right next to each other, there had not yet been a combined activity together until last friday. In order to get to know each other better and to find out more about the research being done in both groups, a lecture series was organized. From both groups four PhD's or Post-Docs presented their work in 10 minutes time. Afterwards the discussion was continued during a borrel at the FCRE-bar. It is planned to have such meetings on a regular basis.

New Site FCRE succesfully launched

December 24th, 2008: After months of work with combined effort, the new site of our group is finally complete and is online with the beginning of the new year. Beside the new layout, also the content was renewed and updated. A good description about the research within FCRE is given, and Bachelor- and Master Assignments can now be found online. If you have any comments or suggestions, don't hesitate to contact the webmaster.

FCRE Germany Tour was a succes

September 30th, 2008: From September 22nd to 26th all staff, technicians, post-docs, PhD-students and students of FCRE group went to Germany to visit different companies. Via Duesseldorf we went to Heidelberg and later returned to Enschede via Cologne. Among others big companies such as E.ON, BASF, Lyondell-Basell, Forschungszentrum Juelich, Degussa-Evonik and Dortmund University were visited.
Of course there was also time for cultural excursions like a walk through the wine yards, a visit to a castle ruin and a tour through Cologne. The week was concluded with a fine dinner in the castle of Bad Bentheim.
Because of its succes, most likely a trip like this will be held every second year from now on.

Martin van Sint Annaland received a VIDI grant from NWO

August 25th, 2008: The dutch organisation for scientific research NWO has granted a VIDI-subsidy to five UT-scientists, among which Martin van Sint Annaland from FCRE. He will receive a maximum amount of 600 kEuro in order to establish a research field in the next five years and to employ one or more scientists.
The subject of this VIDI is a new generation microreactors for hydrogen production. For small-scale hydrogen production a high energy efficiency is essential, which will be made possible by integration of special membranes in a new type microreactor. Fundamental models will be combined with advanced measuring techniques to study this type of reactors.

Two awards for FCRE students

August 1st, 2008: Tom Kolkman, former FCRE student and currently PhD student at our group, has been nominated for the thesis prize of the faculty TNW for his work at FCRE during his master project. The price will be awarded during the opening of the academically year on September 1st. Everyone is invited to come.
Wouter Dijkhuizen, former PhD student at our group and currently working in Trontheim, Norway, received the best paper award during the CFD2008 conference for the paper: Direct Numerical Simulation of the Lift Force in Bubbly Flows.