<p>I know that Chem E is a very versatile field, but I mostly hear of them them being employed for food/agricultural purposes, energy/petroleum purposes, or for the pharmaceutical industry. </p>
<p>I'm not really interested in any of these, but I am into biotech (other than food/ag), so what could I do within the biotech industry? Could someone give me some examples?</p>
<p>Don’t major in ChemE.</p>
<p>The pharmaceutical industry is picking up a lot of biotech products. Nowadays, when you search for biotech on Google or something, most of what you’ll find are biopharmaceuticals. </p>
<p>Having interned at a vaccines company, I can tell you what the chemical engineering grads are doing at that company. Two were in project management (with whom I worked closely). A couple of guys are in the production facility. I think they were monitoring the process to keep it under control. </p>
<p>The guys doing process design are usually biochemistry MS/PhDs I think.</p>
<p>Well steevee, I’m glad you mentioned that, because I think I’d be more interested in management and/or monitoring than actual process design. I consider myself a people person, and I don’t think I’d be able to keep my head in the books all day, if you know what I’d mean.</p>
<p>Also, I know engineering can lead to sales as well, which I might be interested in. Basically, I like the science and the math, but at the same time, I want to be around people a lot.</p>
<p>@PurdueEE, why do you say not to major in it? Do you have any legitimate reasons? (or I’m assume you are in Electrical Engineering from the EE). Being a person interested in both math and chemistry are there any other fields you might recommend looking into?</p>
<p>Well, math or chemistry are options. I feel silly saying that but they’re legitimate college majors.</p>
<p>Materials science/engineering probably has as much or more chemistry than chemical engineering. That’s wild speculation though. I can look into programs if you want.</p>
<p>It sounds like you would like biomedical engineering or biosystems engineering or something like that.</p>
<p>He is not interested in ChemE by his own admission, so why major in it? It sounds like he’d be substantially better off with BME, MSE, Chem, or even ECE.</p>
<p>Well, I’ve never been a “tinkerer” type of person, so I’ve disregarded Mechanical Engineering. My school doesn’t offer Biomedical Eng. As for EE, I don’t have any experience with circuitry and breadboards and all that, so I don’t even know if I’d like it. Something in robotics or even AI would be cool, though AI doesn’t have anything to do with engineering</p>
<p>ME is not about tinkering. AI definitely has a lot to do with engineering.</p>
<p>Well, you could combine robotics, ai, and biotechnology with something in bioinformatics. It might be a major, minor, or concentration in some major at your school.</p>
<p>I would like to know what the OP thinks biotech is if he is not interested in food/ag or pharma industries. </p>
<p>Management/Monitoring of process design generally rise out of process engineering positions into project/program management. Another path, however, is Operations Research and Management via Supply Chain Management, which generally falls under the Industrial Engineering umbrella of disciplines.</p>
<p>ChemE is not much to do with chemistry. You get a good breath of understanding of the field, but I wouldn’t hold a candle to a chemist. ChemE is about creating conditions, rates, and quantities to support a reaction or process, including biochemical reactions, which is why we end up in biotech.</p>
<p>I will give additional advice onto biotech majors if the OP will respond to my opening remarks.</p>
<p>The biotech I’m thinking of (if it even falls under biotech) includes stuff like using stem cells to create organs. I recently watched a show on the History Channel called “That’s Impossible - Eternal Life” and it mentioned the manufacturing of organs to replace older organs. </p>
<p>Another interesting topic were nanobots, which could possibly target and repair/destroy harmed cells. I know nanotechnology falls under Chem E.</p>
<p>There’s a reason why all the people who come out to talk about those things are PhDs. Don’t expect to be able to do tissue engineering with just a BS or MS.</p>
<p>Nanotech isn’t biotech, but is an interesting field. ChemE’s can but I would imagine MechE and EE would be heavy in this research too.</p>
<p>Stem Cell research might be biochemistry or biochemical engineering. If you are interested in pursuing something very specific such as this field or nanotech I would suggest you speak with councilors at specific schools or the school you attend (if you are in college) and find out where these fields fall. Interdisciplinary topics such as these may vary well fall in different realms/colleges at different universities.</p>
<p>Best of luck.</p>
<p>There is the whole misconception about engineers tinkering, yeah, that needs to stop, lol. More like cranking out problem sets and designing which is what you learn to do in school. Tinkering sounds unproductive and is far from what an actually engineer does on the job. Especially in the oil industry. Honestly, you know what we do, we have meetings, and meetings about meetings, and the so called tinkering engineering majors like ME and EE, sit at their desk. Then, they call up a production tech on the rig (i.e. the guy who actually tinkers) and they tell him what projects they want them to do. Then we go back to meetings, lol.</p>
<p>Also guys, the majority of engineers, especially Bachelor’s and sometimes even master’s engineers more than likely never see or do engineering ever again in there lives. If so, it makes up about 10 percent of your job. When you get into management, you don’t see any of it. I’m mostly speaking from an oil industry point of view. The fact is, the guys that are doing the research are the chemists in downstream(oil refining) and the geoloigist in upstream (oil production and exploration). A chemical engineer working in a plant for example, will more than likely be assigned over a team of chemists, and production techs, not to direct their research but more or less, to get projects moved along, completed, and to do design work. A petroleum engineer in the field, will do design work on well heads, valves, use techniques to increase production, oversee a group of Petrol techs, ect. While the geologists job will be researching formations, identifying new oil pockets, and telling the petroleum engineer where the oil is at, so he knows where to drill. If you want to be more associated with people, be linked to management, and oversee or design projects, engineering is the way to go. If you want to strictly research, develop new technologies and investigate new fields, become a scientist. Only specialized engineers, PhD engineers, rarely anyone else, will have the knowledge to do research in a specific area, and even that area will be limited. Oh, another thought, EE’s in downstream, get paid more than the ME’s. Simply because, EE’s knowledge is more vital and specialized to the actual processes.</p>
<p>Thank God I don’t work in Oil, sounds like hell.</p>
<p>What do you mean by upstream and downstream? Sorry English is my second language.</p>
<p>you can major in cheme if you want to do biotech. Nowadays cheme’s get involved in biological systems very often. I think it depends on what electives you’re taking.</p>
<p>Yeah, but bio tech jobs vary by your location. I don’t even know where the bio tech industry is, East Coast? And from what I understand grad degrees are a must. What companies hire for bio tech anyway? Upstream is refering to exploration and production, downstream is another name for the refining sector.</p>