Every CBE student graduates with a Bachelor of Science in Engineering (BSE) degree. Roughly 80 percent supplement their major with an undergraduate minor or certificate. And while they're at it, our students pursue an amazing diversity of passions — from volleyball to chamber orchestra, from start-up companies to semesters abroad.
Below, we've tried to give you a quick look at what it means to be a CBE student. But this decision is far from simple, so please reach out to us with your questions.
Academic Requirements
Here's the basic outline:
- Start with the foundational courses required of all BSE students.
- Dive into theory and experimentation with the CBE Core.
- Choose one of six areas of concentration to organize your electives.
- Embark on a year-long independent research project, known as the senior thesis, advised by a member of the CBE or CBE-affiliated faculty.
For more information please refer to the Undergraduate Handbook.
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Writing Requirement 1 Course Free Electives 1 Course or more (number will vary) -
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Mathematics 4 Courses Physics 2 Courses General Chemistry 1 Course Computer Proficiency 1 Course Humanities and Social Sciences Requirement 7 Courses -
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CBE Core 9 Courses Advanced Science and Math Requirements 6 Courses Area of Concentration Electives 3 Courses Breadth Electives 2 Courses Total 36 Courses Introduction to Chemical and Biochemical Engineering Principles Thermodynamics Separations in Chemical Engineering and Biotechnology Mass, Momentum and Energy Transport Chemical and Biological Engineering Laboratory (Core Lab) Chemical Reaction Engineering Process and Energy Systems Design Senior Thesis (counts as 2) General Chemistry II Organic Chemistry Introduction to Cellular and Molecular Biology Advanced Chemistry or Advanced Biology (300 level or above) Differential Equations Advanced CBE (300 level or above)
Areas of Concentration
Everyone who majors in CBE chooses one of six areas of concentration, which helps organize a student's choice of electives. In practical terms, this means three of your technical electives will come from a group of area-specific selections. Two additional electives come from two different "breadth" areas, which rounds out your over all experience.
Below find the list of electives on offer for each of the six areas of concentration.
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Course Number Course Name CBE 262/ EGR 263 Fundamentals of Bioengineering CBE 411/ MOL 411 Antibiotics: From Cradle to Grave CBE 419 Enzymes CBE 433/ MSE 424 Introduction to the Mechanics and Dynamics of Soft Living Matter CBE 438/ MOL 438 Biomolecular Engineering CBE 439 Quantitative Physiology CBE 440 The Physical Basis of Human Disease CBE 447 Metabolic Engineering CHM 440/ GHP 440 Drug Discovery in the Genomics Era ECE 452 Biomedical Imaging EEB 309 Evolutionary Biology EEB 320/ MOL 320 Molecular Evolutionary Genetics EEB 325 Mathematical Modeling in Biology and Medicine EEB 327/ MOL 327 Immune Systems: From Molecules to Populations ENE 318/ CBE 318 Fundamentals of Biofuels GEO 417 Environmental Microbiology GEO 428 Biological Oceanography ISC 326/ EEB 326/ MOL 326 Human Genomics: The Past, Present and Future of the Human Genome MAE 344 Biomechanics and Biomaterials: From Cells to Organisms MOL 340 Molecular and Cellular Immunology MOL 342 Genetics MOL 345/ CHM 345 Biochemistry MOL 348 Cell and Developmental Biology MOL 410 Introduction to Biological Dynamics MOL 415 Modern Biophysics and Systems Biology MOL 433/ CBE 434 Biotechnology MOL 434 Macromolecular Structure and Mechanisms in Disease MOL 435 Pathogenesis and Bacterial Diversity MOL 448/ CHM 448 Chemistry, Structure and Structure Functions of Nucleic Acids MOL 457 Computational Aspect of Molecular Biology MOL 459 Viruses: Strategy and Tactics MOL 423 Molecular Basis of Cancer NEU 201/ PSY 258 Fundamentals of Neuroscience NEU 202/ PSY 259 Introduction to Cognitive Neuroscience NEU 408/ MOL 408/ PSY 404 Cellular and Systems Neuroscience NEU 437/ MOL 437/ PSY 437 Computational Neuroscience PSY 406 Functional Neuroanatomy PSY 407 Developmental Neuroscience QCB 455/ COS 455 Introduction to Genomics and Computational Molecular Biology -
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Course Number Course Name CBE 260/ EGR 260
Ethics and Technology: Engineering in the Real World
CEE 334/ SPI 452/ ENV 334/ ENE 334
Global Environmental Issues
CEE 460
Risk Assessment and Management
CHV 321/ ENV 321/ SPI 371 Ethical and Scientific Issues in Environmental Policy CHV 331/ SPI 372
Ethics and Public Health
COS 432/ ECE 432
Information Security
ECO 310
Microeconomic Theory: A Mathematical Approach
ECO 311
Macroeconomics: A Mathematical Approach
EGR 491/ ORF 491
High-Tech Entrepreneurship
EGR 494
Leadership Development for Business
EGR 495
Special Topics in Entrepreneurship
EGR 497
Entrepreneurial Leadership
GEO 366/ ENV 339/ SPI 451/ ENE 366
Climate Change: Impacts, Adaptation, Policy
ORF 245
Fundamentals of Engineering Statistics
ORF 335
Introduction to Financial Engineering
ORF 435
Financial Risk Management
SML 201 Introduction to Data Science SPI 373/ CHV 373
Welfare, Economics and Climate Change Mitigation Policy
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Course Number Course Name AST 309/ MAE 309/ PHY 309
Science and Technology of Nuclear Energy: Fission and Fusion
CBE 421/ CHM 421 Green and Catalytic Chemistry CEE 207/ ENV 207
Introduction to Environmental Engineering
CEE 304/ ENV 300/ ENE 304
Environmental Implications of Energy Technologies
CEE 306
Hydrology
CEE 308
Environmental Engineering Laboratory
CEE 311/CHM 311/ GEO 311
Global Air Pollution
CEE 471
Introduction to Water Pollution Technology
CEE 474/ ENV 474
Special Topics in CEE- Design and Construction of Environmental Sensors
CEE 477/ ENE 477
Engineering Design for Sustainable Development
ENE 267/ MSE 287/ CEE 267 Materials for Energy Technologies and Efficiency ENE 318/ CBE 318 Fundamentals of Biofuels ENE 321/ CEE 321/ ENV 371 Resource Recovery for a Circular Economy ENE 410/ CBE 410/ MAE 410 Optimization for the Design and Analysis of Energy Systems ENE 414 Renewable Energy Systems ENE 431
Solar Energy Conversion
ENV 200A-F
The Environmental Nexus
ENV 305
Topics in Environmental Studies – Hormonally Active Pollutants
GEO 360/ ENV 356
Geochemistry of the Human Environment
GEO 361/ ENV 361/ CEE 360
Earth’s Atmosphere
GEO 363/ CHM 331/ ENV 331
Environmental Geochemistry: Chemistry of the Natural Systems
GEO 366/ ENV 339/ SPI 451/ ENE 366
Climate Change: Impacts, Adaptation, Policy
GEO 418/ CHM 418
Environmental Aqueous Geochemistry
GEO 423/ CEE 423
Dynamic Meteorology
GEO 424/ CEE 424/ ENE 425
Introductory Seismology
GEO 470/ CHM 470
Environmental Chemistry of Soils
MAE 328/ EGR 328/ ENV 328
Energy for a Greenhouse-Constrained World
MAE 424/ ENE 424
Energy Storage Systems
MAE 427
Energy Conversion and the Environment: Transportation Applications
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Course Number Course Name CBE 415 /CHM 415/ MSE 425
Polymers
CBE 422/ MSE 422
Molecular Modeling Methods
CBE 430/ MAE 430/ MSE 430 Squishy Engineering: Using Soft Materials to Solve hard Problems CBE 433/ MSE 424
Introduction to the Mechanics and Dynamics of Soft Living Matter
CEE 364/ ARC 364
Materials in Civil Engineering
CHM 403
Advanced Organic Chemistry
CHM 409
Structural Solid State Chemistry
ECE 341
Solid State Devices
ECE 342
Principles of Quantum Engineering
ECE 441/ ENE 441
Solid-State Physics
ECE 449
Materials and Solid-State Device Laboratory
ECE 455/ CEE 455/ MAE 455/ MSE 455 Mid-Infrared Technologies for Health and the Environment GEO 378
Mineralogy
MAE 324/ MSE 324
Structure and Properties of Materials
MSE 301
Materials Science and Engineering
MSE 302
Laboratory Techniques in Materials Science and Engineering
MSE 505 Characterization of Materials -
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Course Number Course Name CBE 422/ MSE 422
Molecular Modeling Methods
COS 217
Introduction to Programming Systems
COS 226
Algorithms and Data Structures
COS 302/ SML 305
Mathematics for Numerical Computing and Machine Learning
COS 340
Reasoning about Computation
COS 343
Algorithms in Computational Biology
COS 402
Artificial Intelligence
COS 424
Interacting with Data
COS 485
Neural Networks: Theory and Applications
EEB 355/ MOL 355
Introduction to Statistics for Biology
ENE 410/ CBE 410/ MAE 410 Optimization for the Design and Analysis of Energy Systems MAE 433
Automatic Control Systems
MAE 434
Modern Control
ORF 245/ EGR 245
Fundamentals of Engineering Statistics
ORF 307
Optimization
ORF 309/ EGR 309/ MAT 280
Probability and Stochastic Systems
ORF 311
Stochastic Optimization and Machine Learning in Finance
ORF 363/ COS 323
Computing and Optimization for the Physical and Social Sciences
ORF 409
Intro to Monte Carlo Simulation
ORF 411/ ECE 411
Sequential Decision Analytics and Modeling
SML 201 Introduction to Data Science SML 305/ ECE 305/ COS 302 Mathematics for Numerical Computing and Machine Learning -
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Course Number Course Name Transport Phenomena
MAE 306/ MAT 392
Mathematics in Engineering II
MAE 336
Viscous Flows
MAE 423/ ENE 423
Heat Transfer
Chemical Technology
CBE 421/ CHM 421
Green and Catalytic Chemistry
CHM 302/304
Organic Chemistry II
CHM 305
The Quantum World
CHM 306
Physical Chemistry: Chemical Thermodynamics and Kinetics
CHM 403
Advanced Organic Chemistry
CHM 405
Advanced Physical Chemistry: Quantum Mechanics
CHM 406
Advanced Physical Chemistry: Chemical Dynamics and Thermodynamics
CHM 407
Inorganic Chemistry: Structure and Bonding
CHM 408
Inorganic Chemistry: Reactions and Mechanisms
Engineering Physics
PHY 207
From Classical to Quantum Mechanics
PHY 208
Principles of Quantum Mechanics
PHY 301
Thermal Physics
PHY 304
Advanced Electromagnetism
PHY 305
Introduction to Quantum Theory
Electronic Materials Processing
ECE 206/ COS 306
Introduction to Logic Design
ECE 308
Electronic and Photonic Devices
ECE 341
Solid State Devices
ECE 342
Principles of Quantum Engineering
ECE 441/ ENE 441
Solid-State Physics
Sample Curriculum
The table below gives you an idea what four years of classes might look like. This schedule is not fixed, and the choice of courses does not account for advanced placement or other considerations. This is simply a baseline curriculum for a typical CBE student. And it is one more tool to guide you along your path to graduation.
FALL | SPRING | |
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First Year | MAT 103 Calculus | MAT 104 Calculus |
PHY 103 Physics | PHY 104 Physics | |
CHM 201 Chemistry | CHM 202 Chemistry | |
Humanities/Social Science | Computing Requirement | |
Writing Requirement | ||
Sophomore Year | MAT 201 Multivariable Calculus | CBE 246 Thermodynamics |
CBE 245 An Introduction to Chemical and Biochemical Engineering Principles | MOL 214 Molecular Biology | |
CHM 301 Organic Chemistry | MAE 305 Differential Equations | |
MAT 202 Linear Algebra | Program Elective | |
Humanities/Social Science | Humanities/Social Science | |
Junior Year | CBE 250 Separations in Chemical Engineering and Biotechnology | CBE 346 Chemical and Biological Engineering Laboratory |
CBE 341 Mass, Momentum, Energy Transport | CBE 441 Chemical Reaction Engineering | |
Program Elective | Program Elective | |
Program Elective | Humanities/Social Science | |
Humanities/Social Science | ||
Senior Year | CBE 442 Process and Energy Systems Design | CBE 454 Senior Thesis |
CBE 454 Senior Thesis | Humanities/Social Science | |
Program Elective | Open Elective | |
Humanities/Social Science | Open Elective |
Contacts
The Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering offers an undergraduate program of study in Chemical Engineering accredited by the Engineering Accreditation Commission of ABET (https://www.abet.org) under the General Criteria and the Program Criteria for Chemical, Biochemical, Biomolecular and Similarly Named Engineering Programs.