Lyle Albright (deceased)

Professor Emeritus of Chemical Engineering

FRNY 2043A
Purdue University
School of Chemical Engineering
Forney Hall of Chemical Engineering
480 Stadium Mall Drive
West Lafayette, IN 47907-2100
(765) 494-4087 (office)
(765) 494-0805 (fax)
B.S.E. University of Michigan, 1943
M.S. University of Michigan, 1944
Ph.D University of Michigan, 1950

Research Interests

Professor Albright's main interests are in the kinetics and mechanisms of several chemical reactions, including alkylation to produce high quality gasoline, pyrolysis reactions for production of olefins, nitration of both aromatics and paraffins, hydrogenation of vegetable oils, partial oxidation and fuel cells. In addition to clarifying the basic chemical reactions, he is interested in both reactor designs and overall processes. He has found that surface reactions often affect so-called gas-phase free radical type reactions, and that interfacial areas in liquid-liquid dispersions are of major importance for alkylation and nitration reactions.

Research Group

Graduate Students

  • Professor Albright has directed 113 theses for graduate students while at Purdue (both M.S. and Ph.Ds).

Awards and Honors

Van Antwerpen Award, AIChE, 2003
Potter Award, 1988
Contributing Editor, Polymer News, 1995-present
AIChE: Director 1982-1984, Fellow 1973
Shreve Prize: 1960, 1970, 1988
Who's Who in America, Who's Who in Engineering, Who's Who in American Education, American Men and Women of Science, Who's Who in Atoms, Who's Who in Society

Selected Publications

Over 220 technical publications including:

Albright, L.F., "Nitration" in McGraw-Hill Encyclopedia of Science and Technology, 9th Edition, Vol. 11, pp. 745-747, McGraw-Hill Book Co., New York, NY, 2002.

Crynes, B.L.; L.F. Albright; and L.F. Tan, "Thermal Cracking," Encyclopedia of Physical Science and Technology, 3rd Edition, Vol. 16, pp. 613-626, Academic Press, 2002.

Albright, L.F., "Alkylation of Isobutane with C3-C5 Olefins: Feedstock Consumption, Acid Usage, and Alkylate Quality for Different Processes," Ind. Eng. Chem. Research 2002, 41, 5627-5631.

Albright, L.F., and D.J. am Ende, "Alkylation-Homogeneous" in Encyclopedia of Catalysis, I.T. Horvath, ed., Vol. 1, pp. 191-210, John Wiley and Sons, Hoboken, New Jersey, 2003.

Albright, L.F., and J.M. Ryan, "Alkylation Processes to Produce High Quality Gasolines," Encyclopedia of Chemical Processing, Vol. 1, pp. 57-66, Taylor and Francis, New York, NY, 2006.

Tsai, T.C. and L.F. Albright, "Thermal Cracking of Hydrocarbons," Encyclopedia of Chemical Processes, Vol. 5, pp. 2975-2986, Taylor and Francis, New York, NY, 2006.

Selected Books

(Dr. Albright has published 10 books.)

"Albright's Chemical Engineering Handbook," November 2008, CRC Press

"Processes for Major Addition-Type Plastics and their Monomers," McGraw-Hill, New York, 1974. Book was "Feature Selection" for January 1974 in McGraw-Hill's Chemical Engineers Book Club; 2nd Edition, Krieger Publishing Co., Melbourne, Florida, 1985.