<p>Hi. Daughter is second year chemE major and she has decided she wants to minor in materials. She is interested in nanotechnology. My husband and I both are finance people so don't really know much about the engineering world. Husband is a bit concerned with her choice to take this route rather than biomed. Her reasoning is she is not interested in biology and the types of courses she would need to take to minor in biomed. </p>
<p>Can someone comment on what types of opportunities there are for a chemE concentrating in materials. And exactly what is nanotechnology?</p>
<p>Thanks!</p>
<p>materials engineering is kind of a highly specialized version of chemE focusing less on fluids and organics and more so on solid state processes.</p>
<p>A lot of chemEs work in the materials industry, these include the semiconductor, fiberoptics, solar cells, high strength materials, biomaterials, green materials, nanomaterials etc.</p>
<p>Your daughter should have plenty of opportunities just with a chemE undergrad degree without the minor in materials to pursue careers in this direction. A old professor in chemE once told me that Materials Science Engineering is more for graduate level training for chemEs or mechEs, since it is kind of specialized towards solids. Although I don't recommend against pursuing a minor in materials since it highly complements traditional chemE work.</p>
<p>What is nanotechnology? Well. thats a question that involves the creation of nanomaterials which encompasses applications towards many many industries and probably can't be answered briefly here..</p>
<p>The poster above me gave some pretty good info. Nano is a growing field, and its becoming more important as we progress into the future.</p>
<p>As long as your daughter is enjoying what she is studying, and she is managing with the workload, I dont think you can go wrong with ChemE and Materials. Also, her minor or area of concentration is not very important as an undergraduate. It wont hold her back from entering other fields within her discipline, should she choose to.</p>
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Husband is a bit concerned with her choice to take this route rather than biomed. Her reasoning is she is not interested in biology and the types of courses she would need to take to minor in biomed.
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<p>Any concentration would be better than biomed if she isn't interested in biology at all.</p>
<p>Materials engineering is a dead end job, first engineers to get laid off. For undergrad, want the most broad engineering degree possible, ME, CHE of EE.. Also, nano is too broad, there is no overlap with woking with nano in fiber optics and nao in engineering plastics. Universities are sprouting nano-tech to over-hype and get more $$$ for keeping their profs doing pointless research....</p>
<p>Quite a different opinion than other posters MiPerson</p>
<p>But my oponion on nano and materials engineering is based on working in this area and being very disappointed in the poor track record of these type products commercializing</p>
<p>MiPerson, I appreciate your opinion. Are you working in the field as an engineer, if so, what kind? Or are you a student who has been on internships/co-ops.?</p>
<p>As I said, my daughter's major is ChemE she is just interested in materials/nano as opposed to biomed or petroleum. </p>
<p>What fields do you think have the best opportunities for ChemE's?</p>
<p>My background is market development for a large chemical company (i.e., I call on engineering groups in the automotive industry), with a BS and MS in ME and a PE . So I work with research and bring new products to commercialization. I have a son accepted at some top colleges but going business...he had the grades and test scores for engineering but discouraged about what he is seeing in the auto market. I have worked with nano materials but the problem is that they all have issues and not really improved properties. My guidance is that young engineers should stay broad, major in EE, ME or Che AND STAY AWAY FROM BIO (over-hyped....not enough of an industrial base to support all of these bio-engineering majors). A broad engineering degree alolow you to be flexible.....but I do recommend co-oping if possible, this really impresses employers. Also, after your graduate, do a couple of yers in industry then go back and get an MBA and get on the marketing side of the companies (Lou Gerstner of IBM was an ChE)</p>
<p>I'll agree with MiPerson about bio and these new "nanotech" degrees not being worth a while lot. There's a ton of breadth to them, but very little depth due to how widespread the field is.</p>
<p>I haven't heard any of my materials friends that graduated a few years back having issues with finding/keeping jobs, though. Same with PhDs that are graduating from my current department.</p>
<p>actually a good majority of ChemEs go into bio, so you should talk it over with your daughter. If you cut out petro/industrial chemicals and bio, you are basically left with moving into management/business side or food manufacturing which is kind of like bio.</p>