The American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE) and its publishing partner John Wiley and Sons, Inc. release the inaugural issue of the Journal of Advanced Manufacturing and Processing — a peer-reviewed journal that captures leading-edge manufacturing techniques and technologies that reportedly reduce costs, save energy and create solutions that address societal needs.
The journal’s main focus areas — chemical manufacturing and processing, smart manufacturing and biological and biochemical manufacturing — incorporate topics as diverse as process intensification, modularization, sustainable manufacturing, sensors and automation, additive manufacturing (3D printing), nanofabrication, cell and tissue manufacturing and biopharmaceutical processing.
The first issue contains articles that illuminate several of those themes. The themes of process intensification and modularization underpin articles contributed by Robert Weber (Pacific Northwest National Laboratory) and Fanxing Li (North Carolina State University). Weber’s article focuses on how process economics can be improved by increasing the scale of the manufacturing systems that makes process modules, rather than increasing the scale of the process itself. Articles by Bhavik Bakshi (The Ohio State University) and Michael Overcash (Environmental Genome Initiative) highlight the importance of sustainability and sustainability metrics to advanced manufacturing, including how an understanding of life cycle assessment metrics can help drive industry toward more sustainable practices. Another paper, contributed by Wei Ge (Chinese Academy of Sciences), focuses on how advanced computing and “virtual process engineering” can support traditional large-scale processing.
Matthew Realff (Georgia Institute of Technology), the journal’s editor-in-chief, explained the importance of advanced manufacturing techniques to industry and the U.S. economy: “The Journal of Advanced Manufacturing and Processing will connect fundamental understanding and discovery to important societal problems through the manufacturing and processing of chemicals and materials. Uniquely, it offers a venue for research that seeks to connect to manufacturing and processing in a way that highlights benefits through improved metrics of performance such as cost, energy, health outcomes or sustainability.”
The new journal also spotlights the results being realized by the Rapid Advancement in Process Intensification Deployment (RAPID) Manufacturing Institute, led by AIChE, as well as other Manufacturing USA institutes. Manufacturing USA is a public-private network of 14 consortia aimed at securing U.S. global leadership in advanced manufacturing.
For more information, visit: www.aiche.org
