Chemical products are amazing! Rocket fuels, heat transfer
fluids, aircraft deicing fluids, windshield washer fluids,
paints, lubricants, nail polish, artificial blood, energy storage
materials. These are just a few of the infinite
number of chemical products that help us stay safe, enjoy
life and explore the universe around us. (These are also
chemical products we have worked on over the years.) We believe
the key to understanding chemicals products, and the key to
designing even better chemical products, is the understanding
of physical properties. Specifically, understanding how chemical
products are a function of their physical properties and how
physical properties are a function of their chemical composition
and structure.
At Molecular Knowledge Systems we are continually increasing
our knowledge of
physical properties, specifically our knowledge of the
relationships between molecular structure and physical
properties. Every day we compile
physical property data on chemicals and mixtures,
evaluate, extend and develop physical property estimation
techniques, add new capabilities to our software tools, and
analyze and design innovative new chemical products.
Our goal is to disseminate the knowledge we gain to our
customers through
Cranium, our physical
property estimation software,
Synapse, our chemical
product design software, and our
consulting services. Even
though many of our customers are themselves experts in physical
properties or experts at designing their own chemical products, our
exclusive focus on physical properties provides them with
advanced tools, innovative analyses and a very unique, often
quite different, perspective on chemical products.
"Can we estimate the properties of organotin compounds?" "What
else can we use helium for?" "How can we prevent a salt
tailings pile from dissolving when it rains?" "Can we select
better solvents for absorbing carbon dioxide?" Customers use our
software tools and consulting services because they have physical
property based questions. We answer these questions in three
ways:
- Cranium Software: our physical property data management and estimation software. Cranium can predict properties including vapor pressures, thermal properties, critical properties, surface tensions, environmental properties and safety properties.
- Synapse Software: our chemical product design software can design solvent blends, new lubricants, paint strippers, aircraft deicing fluids, rocket fuels, refrigerant mixtures and many other chemical products.
- Consulting Services: Since 1989 we have designed lubricants, refrigerants, reaction solvents, cleaning solvents, polymer gels, deicing fluids, fuel additives, soil consolidants, jet fuel additives and sonar fill fluids. (Right: Dr. Joback and colleagues in front of a sodium chloride tailings pile.)
Many of our customers are working with chemicals and mixtures for which very little or no physical property data is available. Others are looking to improve the performance of their current products or even design brand new products. Our customers often have considerable expertise in process chemistry and process design and are quite familiar with chemical software tools. We are also beginning to gain academic customers who are using both Cranium and Synapse in the education of new chemists and chemical engineers.
Our customers are our greatest resource. Our customers, both current and future, help guide our development of new capabilities for Cranium and Synapse and the extension of our knowledge base of physical property data and models.
| Some of Our Customers' Industries | ||
|---|---|---|
| Flavors & Fragrances | Pharmaceuticals | Energetic Materials |
| Consumer Products | Paints & Coatings | Monomers/Polymers |
| Industrial Gases | Specialty Solvents | Refrigerants |
| Lubricant Additives | Food Additives | Research Institutes |
In August of 1989, Dr. Kevin Joback, an internationally recognized
expert in the fields of physical property estimation and chemical
product design, founded Molecular Knowledge Systems. Early consulting
projects gave us in-depth experience with lubricants, solvents, heat
transfer fluids, extraction processes, cleaning equipment, expert
systems for polymer selection
and much more.
More than a dozen of those early projects were
funded through the SBIR (
Small Business Innovative Research) program.
On those SBIR projects, we worked as a subcontractor to other
innovative small businesses. That experience helped develop our
understanding
of how to work as an external resource for technical research
teams.
For his graduate work at MIT, Dr. Joback developed physical property estimation techniques and used artificial intelligence methods to design molecules. His knowledge and early projects on developing physical property estimation software and an expert system for selecting injection moldable plastics gave us an appreciation for how software tools could provide great insights for process and product design. With the development of our Cranium and Synapse software tools, we began collaborating with process simulation and equipment design companies.
Today we work diligently to maintain our leadership in the fields of physical property estimation and chemical product design, continue to strengthen our partnerships with other leading chemical software companies and continue to look for opportunities to grow and expand.
There are always more physical properties to estimate and more chemical products to design.