Phillip Wankat

Clifton L. Lovell Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Chemical Engineering and Professor Emeritus of Engineering Education

FRNY 1148
Purdue University
Davidson School of Chemical Engineering
Forney Hall of Chemical Engineering
480 Stadium Mall Drive
West Lafayette, IN 47907-2100
(765) 494-0814 (office)
(765) 494-0805 (fax)
Joined Purdue in 1970
B.S. Purdue University, 1966
Ph.D Princeton University, 1970
M.S.Ed Purdue University, 1982

Research Interests

Professor Wankat is interested in separation processes and in improving engineering education. His current research in separation processes focuses on distillation.

Distillation is considered to be a mature separation technique. However, because of the huge scale of distillation operations, even modest improvements can have a major impact. We are now looking at new operating methods for batch and unsteady distillation.

For a variety of reasons the engineering education system in the United States is currently in a state of flux. Because of this, there is an opportunity to improve the system. Professor Wankat is one of the national leaders in developing methods to teach graduate students and new professors how-to-teach and in developing methods to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of faculty.

Research Group

Graduate Students

  • Prof. Wankat no longer accepts graduate students.

Selected Publications

Wankat, P. C., "Economic Analysis for Improved Rectifying Columns," Separ. Sci. Technol, 50(16), 2525-2531 (2015).

Wankat, P. C., "Decreasing costs of distillation columns with vapor feeds," Chemical Engineering Science, 137 , 955-963 (2015).

Soepriatna, N., Wang, N. H. L. and Wankat, P. C., "Standing Wave Design and Optimization of Non-Linear Four-Zone Thermal SMB Systems," Ind. Engr Chem. Research, 54 (42), 10419-10433 (2015).

Soepriatna, N., Wang, N. H. L. and Wankat, P. C., "Standing Wave Design of 2-Zone Thermal Simulated Moving Bed Concentrator" Ind. Engr Chem. Research, (in press).

Wankat, P. C. and Bullard, L. G., "The Future of Engineering Education Revisited," Chem. Engr. Educ., 50 (1), 19-28 (Winter 2016).

Williams, B., P. C. Wankat, and P. Neto, "Not so global: a bibliometric look at engineering education research," European Journal Engineering Education, (in press, 2016).

Book Chapters:

Wankat, P.C. and K. S. Knaebel, ???Mass Transfer,??? Section 5B, in Perry's Handbook of Chemical Engineering, 9th ed., Green, D. (Ed.), McGraw-Hill, New York, p. 5-1, 5-2, 5-43 to 5-83 (in preparation).

Books:

The first edition of Teaching Engineering is available for free.

Wankat, P.C. and Oreovicz, F.S., Teaching Engineering, 2nd Edition, Purdue University Press, West Lafayette, IN, 2015. Separation Process Engineering. Includes Mass Transfer Analysis, 4th edition, Wankat, P. C., Prentice-Hall, Upper Saddle River, NJ (in press 2016)