[kimiko20]

Hi! 
I am a newbie here, I decided to join this forum because this coming semester I will be a 4th year chemical engineering student.
I would like to ask, what topic would be best for research? something that has many related studies and such but is something new and interesting.
thank you all

[Enthalpy]

http://www.chemicalforums.com/index.php?topic=65386.0
http://www.chemicalforums.com/index.php?topic=68477.msg253893#msg253893
http://www.chemicalforums.com/index.php?topic=57335.0
http://www.scienceforums.net/topic/79128-alloys-to-store-hydrogen/
 (hypothetical)
http://www.chemicalforums.com/index.php?topic=72951.0
 (can be a big thing, or a flop)
http://www.chemicalforums.com/index.php?topic=46384.0
 (not exactly chemistry, but money-maker)
http://www.chemicalforums.com/index.php?topic=56452.0
http://www.scienceforums.net/topic/78116-airlock-with-saving-tanks/
 (not strictly chemistry)
http://www.chemicalforums.com/index.php?topic=69074.msg248896#msg248896
 (if it has uses, you must produce it)
http://www.chemicalforums.com/index.php?topic=69134.msg249048#msg249048
http://www.scienceforums.net/topic/80517-spacecraft-propulsion/#entry781679
 make food from astronauts' waste - essentially engineering, due to constraints

You could design a reliable plant to separate radioactive elements from water at Fukushima.
OK, OK, not fun, my apologies.
Or at sewage treatment plants, where all radioactivity that rained down lies now in the stored mud.

More seriously: UV lamps are available in big power, varied wavelengths, at a reasonable price, recently. This should change the way many chemicals are produced. Only mercury lamps were used with sensitizers in the past, but adequate wavelengths will improve efficiencies and selectivity. Time now for research?

[DoctorDomo]

You get to choose your reserch topic? Give me time and I'll come up with plenty of ideas. But what I'd like to research if I had free reign of a lab is the effects of attempting to manipulate chemical interactions by modulating EM frequencies/amplitudes as well as magnetic and electric fields. Maybe throw ultrasound into the mix. Or maybe some crazy experiment to see if you can make a proton conductor, similar to how electrons are conducted through copper. Then again, thats kinda whatcapillary electrophoresis is all about. Or maybe a membrane that separates a negatively charged plate, from a positive one, so that the compounds are locked in close proximity to the positively charged plate so they become dishielded and have their protons exposed, then on the membrane there could be some kind of nucleophilic material ready to attack the electron deficient compounds. Or what about using mass spectrometry to synthesise new compouds, you choose specific cationic fragments which will react with a nucleophilic material which is embedded on the walls, on the way to the anode. Or vice versa for anionic fragments. Not to mention radical cations.

[DoctorDomo]

I just finished my 4th year project, and while it was interesting, it wasn't my proect, I just made a little contribution without knowing the big picture. I wish I had free reign of a well equipped lab so I can do my weird experiments. I'm not much of an academic but I hope someday to meet a researcher who is into this kind of thing, and will get me in there. Gravities something I'd like to play with. Osmius is the densest metal on the periodic table, but the tetroxide is a gas. That gets me pondering. With the right catalytic reducing agent... Gravities a pretty mysterious force. I'm kinda rambling on, so I'll shut up now.