Although the subject of electrochemistry has been known and studied for over 150 years, as a full- fledged wing of chemical engineering, ECE came of age in the forties and fifties when the concept was realized that any electrode reaction, despite its characteristics, is amenable to the same kind of fundamental approach as is applied to heterogeneous catalysis. The second concept that delineated ECE as a branch of chemical engineering is that the rate of electrode reactions is generally affected by the catalytic properties of the substrate of the electronic conductor as well as by the interplay of mass transport mechanisms which determine the diffusion rate of electroactive species. Today, electrochemical technologies are providing cleaner and more efficient energy for portable electronic applications, vehicle propulsion, load leveling, and solutions to pollution problems.
Batteries are an important part of our society today.
Recent advances in portable electronics, laptop computers, and wireless communications have resulted in a significant growth in the need for small, high energy, reliable power sources. The research for new battery materials, optimization of existing electrochemical couples, or extending battery life are problems that could be solved by people trained in ECE fundamentals. In electrosynthesis, the generation of oxidizing chemicals for pollution control remains a viable field for exploitation. In addition, the removal of toxic impurities from lean waste streams by electrodeposition or oxidation of organic components remains attractive. Other important areas of research include ionic mass transport by combined diffusion, migration, and convection, transport properties of concentrated, multi-component electrolytes, current distribution, and formation of new phases and modeling of composite processes in batch and flow systems.