l engineers concern themselves with the chemical processes that turn raw materials into valuable products. The skills necessary for this encompass all areas of design, testing, operation, scale-up, control, and optimization. A detailed understanding of various unit operations, that is individual chemical operations, is needed for the conversion of these raw materials into valuable products to be possible. To analyze and improve these unit operations a chemical engineer utilizes mass, momentum, and energy transfers, as well as thermodynamics and chemical kinetics (Pafko "Chemical Engineer"). Chemical engineers should have an interest and aptitude in math and science as well as good analytical skills. They must be able to work as part of a team and to communicate their ideas well. Chemical engineers must be innovative and original and enjoy the challenge of mastering new areas of their field ("Chemical Engineer" 103). A chemical engineer works with the production of chemicals as well as other products that may require chemical processing. Generally they build on the findings of research chemists, who work with small amounts of materials in laboratories. Concerned with the design, construction, operation, and marketing of equipment that can reproduce on a large scale the processes or products developed by chemists, they work with industrial chemical processes to help produce a large variety of goods. A chemical engineer may also work in many types of industries, primarily though ones that produce chemicals, petroleum, and electronic products ("Chemical Engineer" 101). According to Pafko, a chemical engineer is either currently, or has previously, occupied the CEO position for: 3M, Du Pont, General Electric, Union Carbide, Dow Chemical, Exxon, BASF, Gulf Oil, Texaco, and B.F. Goodrich. Chemicals are used in the processing and treatment of many of the foods we eat, much of the water we drink, and many of the clothes we wear. It is the che...
