Microreaction Engineering: Is Small Really Better?

Microfabrication technologies are increasingly used in different fields of chemistry to realize test and produce materials with capabilities exceeding those of conventional macroscopic systems. In addition to already demonstrated chemical and biological analysis applications, microfabricated chemical systems are expected to have a number of advantages for chemical synthesis, chemical kinetics studies and process development. Chemical processing advantages from increased heat and mass transfer in small dimensions are demonstrated with gas, liquid, and multiphase reaction systems which lead to inherently safer and more benign design. In addition a synthetic fuel application will be discussed in detail.