"theoretical knowledge into practice" - Statement for Chemical Engineering ( Ph.D.)

The following is my SOP I wrote after taking help from this forum and other places. Please suggest iF I need to change anything.

Statement Of Purpose

Ultimate happiness can only be obtained when you share your joy and spread smile across other people's faces. It is only when you see your actions making a positive impact in others lives you can realize how useful you truly can be. I sincerely wish to utilize my knowledge that I gain through my education for the same purpose where I can look back and be contented with the fact that I was indeed useful to the mankind. It is this desire for learning, invention and teaching that has made me decide to continue my education towards a Ph.D. degree.

I was born in an educated Indian middle class with strong social values of hard work. My mother being a teacher herself inculcated in me the moral virtues along with the basic concepts and the power to reason. In my opinion, the fundamentals I learned from my parents were critical to elaborate profound ideas later on. I developed a strong liking for mathematics and physics during my high school days and soon found out that engineering was where my heart lies since the knowledge I gain would help me to solve practical problems in everyday life.

My ‎formal advanced education started with my undergraduate program in chemical ‎engineering at the Department of Chemical Engineering in XXXX in India. In my ‎undergraduate years, I have acquired a strong background in the fundamentals of ‎basic chemical engineering subjects like thermodynamics, heat and mass transfer, ‎fluid mechanics, chemical reactions engineering. I found laboratory work very interesting which gave me an opportunity to put my theoretical knowledge into practice.

In the summer of 2009 I first had a chance to work in research based work under Dr. XX in my university. It was a wonderful experience and my perseverance bore fruit as we found out that charred citrus fruit peel can indeed be used as a low cost adsorbent to treat polluted industrial waste water. I presented my work in a National seminar where various delegates from different parts of my country greatly appreciated our work. Confident of my capabilities in the field of research, I embarked on another research project in the summer of 2010 at the Chemical Engineering Department of XXX situated at XX, India to develop a model for the esterification of ethylene glycol with acetic acid using Amberlyst36 as catalyst. We successfully developed two models and I presented our work at International Conference on Modeling, Optimization and Computing (ICMOC 2010). My short stint at the production factory of Berger Paints, India also filled me enormous inspiration actually implementation of theory in large scale and how research and development is so important for industries to flourish and reach its full potential. I chose my final year dissertation topic on modeling and simulation of pyrolysis of biomass which will provide us useful insight for detailed combustion and gasification of biomass and development of a realistic model of industrial importance.

I am interested in the field of catalysis and chemical reaction engineering with the help of modeling and simulation. Modeling and simulation of different reaction systems along with developmentof novel catalytic material can go a long way to solve the problem of environmental pollution and development of newer cleaner technologies which will prevent generation of toxic materials. Pyrolysis of biomass which is now considered to be an important source of renewable fuel is also an area where catalysis and modeling simulation can play an important role. The Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering of XXX University is one of the most reputed departments with renowned faculty and state-of-the-art laboratories in this field. I have been specially influenced by the papers entitled "-----------------" by *************. Working under the supervision of such renowned professors will be a privilege and would give me the opportunity to contribute something original to the field. I have full ‎confidence that my diligence, dedication, and genuine interest in learning coupled ‎with the exceptional guidance I can receive in University of XXX will allow me to ‎contribute to my fields of interest. I would greatly enjoy and appreciate the ‎opportunity to do so at your institution. ‎

I think it should be smiles...im not sure.


This should be gained.


I think this should be to mankind.


The basic concepts of what? Also, what kind of fundamentals did u learn?


This is an extremely long sentence. I suggest you break them up, or insert a comma somewhere.

This is an extremely well written essay with a few errors here and there, so take a few days off and look at it again with fresh eyes to see these mistakes. This paper definitely showed how dedicated and interested you are in this field. Awesome work dude!!

Thank you so much for your corrections and help.

yes! It should be...

It is this desire for learning, invention and teaching that has made me decide to continue my education towards a Ph.D. degree.----too vague. You should have another sentence after this before ending the first para. Don't leave the reader hanging on an ambiguity.

End that first para with a statement of what you are all about... something to help them make sense of you in their minds.

I have full ‎confidence that my diligence, dedication, and genuine interest in learning coupled ‎with the exceptional guidance I can receive in University of XXX will allow me to ‎contribute to my fields of interest. ---here is another important sentence. This one should be changed so that it refers to that main theme... not "dedication and interest in learning," but instead a specific intention to accomplish some specific goals in your chosen field. Nevermind interest in learning. The point is to show them that you are in the process of making a specific contribution, so you should choose some specific goals and explain why this program is better than all your alternative options for sending you along the path you have chosen.

The accomplishments you describe are impressive, and I think I could not survive in the classes you have taken! I am only criticizing the main focus of the essay to try to help you... It is too wishy washy at the beginning and end.

:-)