Our department offers two majors: Chemical Engineering and Biochemical Engineering.
Internship/Research Information
- ECH 192: Internship in Chemical Engineering
- Complete this form to receive units for your internship with a company outside of UC Davis. A Chemical Engineering faculty member will need to sponsor your internship and sign off as the “faculty sponsor” on the petition prior to beginning your internship. Return the form, complete with signatures, via email to chms-ugadvising@ucdavis.edu by the 10th day of instruction. Late forms will not be approved. Once it has been reviewed for completeness, you will be issued a CRN, which you will use to register the credit on Schedule Builder.
- International Students Interested in ECH 192
- International students must complete a CPT form with SISS in order to work at an internship site. You must be enrolled in ECH 192 in order for a CHMS advisor to sign off on your CPT. If you are not enrolled in the course, please enroll first and then send the form to our office. CPT forms can be submitted via email for advisor review.
Advisor information to include in your form -- - Advisor Name: CHMS UG Advising
- - Advisor Email: chms-ugadvising@ucdavis.edu
Do not send your iGlobal form to a specific advisor's email as the form can get easily lost in their email. Always send forms to the CHMS UG advising email for the quickest turn around time.
- ECH 199: Research in Chemical Engineering
- Use this variable-unit course form to receive units for the research you are doing with a Chemical Engineering faculty member. After writing your project proposal, please have your instructor sign the form. Return the form, complete with signatures, via email to chms-ugadvising@ucdavis.edu by the 10th day of instruction. Late forms will not be approved. Once it has been reviewed for completeness, you will be issued a CRN, which you will use to register the credit on Schedule Builder.
Chemical Engineering
COE Degree Requirements
2023-2025 Major Requirements and Sample Academic Plans (starts Fall 2023)
Example Uses of Chemical Engineering Technical Elective Requirements
GE Worksheet Checklist
UCD Catalog
See anticipated changes to the curriculum for Fall 2023: Info Session with Professor White
- Chemical Engineering Major Description
- Chemical engineers apply the principles of chemistry and engineering to produce useful commodities, ranging from fuels to polymers. Chemical engineers are increasingly concerned with chemical and engineering processes related to the environment and food production. They work in areas as diverse as integrated circuits and integrated waste management. Preparation for a career in chemical engineering requires an understanding of both engineering and chemical principles to develop proficiency in conceiving, designing, and operating new processes. The chemical engineering curriculum has been planned to provide a sound knowledge of engineering and chemical sciences so that you may achieve competence in treating current and future technical problems.
- Eligibility to Declare Chemical Engineering Major (current UCD students)
- In order to be eligible to change to the Chemical Engineering major, all students must meet the following requirements:
A C- or better and a cumulative GPA of a 2.0 or higher required in the following courses:
- MAT 21A
- MAT 21B
- MAT 21C
- PHY 9A
- CHE 2A
Additional Requirements:
- 2.0 UC GPA in all other completed engineering courses
- 2.0 GPA in all completed MAT, PHY, CHE, and BIS courses required for Chemical Engineering major
- No grade lower than a C- in any courses required for Chemical Engineering major
- Good academic standing
- Completed at least one quarter (12 units) at UCD
- Completed less than 135 cumulative units (excluding AP/IB/A-Level units)
- Received a letter grade (no P/NP) for all courses that satisfy engineering degree requirements
Transfers: must meet transfer admissions requirements in addition to the requirements listed above.
Important Notes:
Transfer credit counts for eligibility purposes. While only UC grades will count in your UC GPA, the courses from other institutions will satisfy the requirements to declare as long as they are articulated courses via Assist. Prospective transfers students should refer to requirements set by Admissions. - Pass/No Pass Grade Policy
- College of Engineering: The College of Engineering does not allow major courses to be taken as P/NP. Please refer to the EUO Policy webpage for more information.
- Archived Major Checklists and Sample Plans
2022-2023 Degree Requirements (expired)
2021-2022 Degree Requirements (expired)
2020-2021 Degree Requirements (expired)
Biochemical Engineering
COE Degree Requirements
2023-2025 Major Requirements and Sample Academic Plans (starts Fall 2023)
GE Worksheet Checklist
UCD Catalog
See anticipated changes to the curriculum for Fall 2023: Info Session with Professor White
- Biochemical Engineering Major Description
Biochemical engineers are in high demand in the rapidly growing biotechnology/pharmaceutical, biofuels and biorefinery industries. As the biotechnology industry expands and matures, there is increasing need for engineers who can move products from the research stage to the pilot scale and ultimately to large scale manufacturing. As they fill this need, engineers must understand the production, purification, and regulatory issues surrounding biopharmaceutical manufacturing. Biochemical engineers are also critical for the development and commercialization of sustainable and economic processes to produce liquid transportation fuels from biomass, algae and waste streams from other manufacturing processes. Future “biorefineries” will include coproduction of a wide range of chemical feedstocks, oils, and polymers thereby contributing to the economic viability of larger volume, lower valued compounds such as biofuels.
Biochemical engineers—with their strong foundations in chemistry, biological sciences, and chemical process engineering—are in a unique position to tackle these problems. Biochemical engineers apply the principles of cell and molecular biology, biochemistry, and engineering to develop, design, scale-up, optimize, and operate processes that use living cells, organisms, or biological molecules for the production and purification of products (such as monoclonal antibodies, vaccines, therapeutic proteins, antibiotics, industrial enzymes, ethanol and more complex biofuels); for health and/or environmental monitoring (such as diagnostic kits, microarrays, biosensors); or for environmental improvement (such as bioremediation). An understanding of biological processes is also becoming increasingly important in the industries that traditionally employ chemical engineers, such as the materials, chemicals, food, energy, fuels, and semiconductor processing industries.
- Eligibility to Declare Biochemical Engineering Major (current UCD students)
- In order to be eligible to change to the Biochemical Engineering major, all students must meet the following requirements:
A C- or better and a cumulative GPA of a 2.0 or higher required in the following courses:
- MAT 21A
- MAT 21B
- MAT 21C
- PHY 9A
- CHE 2A
Additional Requirements:
- 2.0 UC GPA in all other completed engineering courses
- 2.0 GPA in all completed MAT, PHY, CHE, and BIS courses required for Biochemical Engineering major
- No grade lower than a C- in any courses required for Biochemical Engineering major
- Good academic standing
- Completed at least one quarter (12 units) at UCD
- Completed less than 135 cumulative units (excluding AP/IB/A-Level units)
- Received a letter grade (no P/NP) for all courses that satisfy engineering degree requirements
Transfers: must meet transfer admissions requirements in addition to the requirements listed above.
Important Notes:
Transfer credit counts for eligibility purposes. While only UC grades will count in your UC GPA, the courses from other institutions will satisfy the requirements to declare as long as they are articulated courses via Assist. Prospective transfers students should refer to requirements set by Admissions. - Pass/No Pass Grade Policy
- The College of Engineering does not allow major courses to be taken as P/NP. Questions regarding P/NP should be referred to EUO. Please refer to the EUO Policy webpage for more information.
- Archived Major Checklists and Sample Plans
2022-2023 Degree Requirements (expired)
2021-2022 Degree Requirements (expired)
2020-2021 Degree Requirements (expired)
Course Offerings
Course offerings will be updated on a quarterly basis. Please to the Class Search Tool for courses that will be offered by the Department throughout the academic year