ALICE, Associate Laboratory for Innovation in Chemical Engineering, has been approved for Associate Laboratory Status. The ALICE consortium, is composed by CEFT, LEPABE and LSRE-LCM, three R&D Units based at the Department of Chemical Engineering at FEUP.

The Associate Laboratory status is attributed to institutions or consortia of scientific institutions that make institutional commitments to carry out the country's scientific and technological policy objectives, in a very competitive call. The status also grants complementary budget.

Congratulations to all ALICE members for achieving this remarkable result!

The contribution of Ph.D. student Carlos Vega-Aguilar was selected to be the front cover art of Volume 60, Issue 9 of Industrial & Engineering Chemistry Research (I&EC) Journal. 

The cover image is from the work entitled Effect of Methoxy Substituents on Wet Peroxide Oxidation of Lignin and Lignin Model Compounds: Understanding the Pathway to C4 Dicarboxylic Acids by Carlos A. Vega-Aguilar, M.F. Barreiro and A.E. Rodrigues (2021).

 According to I&EC, the cover is about:
"Lignin model compounds (p-hydroxybenzoic acid, vanillic acid, and syringic acid) and hardwood and softwood lignin samples were oxidized using hydrogen peroxide oxidation to evaluate methoxy substituents' effect in C4-DCA production (succinic, maleic, fumaric, malic, and tartaric acids)."

Congratulations Carlos!

More info at https://pubs.acs.org/toc/iecred/60/9