ChE changes name to CBE

When the Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering — previously known as the Department of Chemical Engineering — officially adopted its revised name on July 1, 2010, department administrators said they hoped that the change would more accurately reflect the department’s goals in recognition of surging student interest and the nationwide growth of the field.

A year later, students said they feel the name change is influencing the department’s appeal to prospective concentrators, with more underclassmen interested in biological sciences and medicine choosing to major in CBE.

One such student is prospective concentrator Katelyn Lesse ’15, who said in an email that she considers chemical engineering her “second choice” and hopes to focus on biomedical engineering in her academic work.

“When I saw that Princeton had a chemical and biological engineering department, I knew that I’d be in a great place since I could study both areas and concentrate in whichever I ended up liking better,” Lesse explained.

Meanwhile, CBE concentrator Cathy Chen ’14 explained that the new name better incorporates her original interest in the field of biomedical engineering.

“Chemical engineering brings to my mind oil refineries and other non-biological processes,” she said in an email. “So including the ‘biological’ part in the name makes it easier for the department to emphasize the biological side of chemical engineering.”

Students such as Jennifer Tse ’12 said that while they did not feel personally affected by the name change, they still feel that it has influenced the department’s appeal to prospective concentrators.

“I feel like more students were choosing CBE because they were interested in the [biological] component more than the actual chemical engineering,” Tse said in an email.

But Tse, who had joined the department before its name change, emphasized that she “came in as a chemical engineering major and still considers [herself] one.” She added that she did not feel the department had undergone any major changes beyond the name.

“You can technically major in CBE without taking a really bioengineering-based course,” she said.

About half of the current CBE majors also pursue a certificate in Engineering Biology, according to department chair and professor Richard Register GS ’86.

The department’s name change was approved in December 2009, following a series of departmental discussions and an official vote among University faculty. But since the department’s curriculum had already evolved over the past 10 years, the structure of the curriculum remains the same after the recent name change, Register explained.

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Concentrators are still required to take nine core courses regardless of their desired track, as well as complete specific math and science requirements.

Students interested in biological engineering can explore these passions through their choice of electives and their thesis topic, Register said, noting that this is a continuation of the previous curriculum structure. Since the chemical engineering department was always the “only critical mass effort in bioengineering,” the department had begun to accommodate students with interests in biological engineering long before the name change, he explained. He added that the rapid growth of the biological engineering field led the department to gradually increase its elective offerings and hire more faculty in those areas.

Eventually, the growing role of biological engineering in the department led to the collective recognition among faculty that a revised name might more accurately reflect its goals, Register explained, adding that the department’s decision was also influenced by peer universities’ decisions to rename their chemical engineering departments.

But Register emphasized that the addition of “biological engineering” to the department’s name occurred only after the department felt it had a sufficient number of faculty and course offerings to warrant its inclusion. The goal of the name change, he said, was always to have “name reflect reality,” rather than the other way around.