The Faculty of Chemical Engineering was established as an independent faculty of the Institute of Chemical Technology, Prague in 1960 under the name Faculty of Chemical Production Automation andEconomics. It was comprised of four basic departments (Processes and Apparatuses, Economics and Management of the Chemical and Food Industries, Mathematics and Physics). In 1969 it was renamed to the Faculty of Chemical Engineering.
The Faculty's activity is in many ways connected with the history of the current Department of Chemical Engineering, and with lectures on chemical engineering which were launched by Professor George Standart at the Faculty of Chemical Technology Engineering of the Czech Technical University in 1948. In 1952, after the establishment of the independent Institute of Chemical Technology, Prague, these courses were assigned to its new Department of the Processes and Apparatuses of Chemical Technology. It was chaired by Professor Hanuš Steidl who became the first Dean of the Faculty in 1960. Other prominent figures of the Department included Professor Emil Slavíček, who stood in the head of the Department of Physics in 1958, and Professor Jiří Sládeček, who founded the Department of Chemical Production Automation in 1962.
The current Department of Mathematics and the Department of Physics and Measurements originally existed as one joint Department of Mathematics and Physics which split in 1958. The independent Department of Physics was later renamed to the Department of Industrial Physics and Electrical Engineering. Both departments have always largely contributed to instruction in the core subjects common to all students at the Institute of Chemical Technology. The Department of Economics and Management of Chemical and Food Industry has been independent since the very birth of the Faculty. Its inter-disciplinary character made it an inseparable part of the whole Faculty.
Subsequent changes in the structure of the Faculty ensued from the needs of quickly expanding fields taught at the Faculty. The year 1973 saw the establishment of the department of automated control systems in the chemical and food industries, which was later renamed to the Department of Computing and Control Engineering. Its activity was originally focused on instruction in the core subject Computing, in Cybernetics, and in the newly introduced field of study which dealt with automated control systems. The decision to provide a five-semester course in Computing to all students at the Institute of Chemical Technology was a major contribution to the Institute at that time.
Further expansion of the Faculty led to the establishment of the Department of Analytical Chemistry and the Department of Physical Chemistry, both building on a rich history connected with a number of prominent figures. Instruction in analytical chemistry dates back to the year 1869 when the Prague Polytechnic split into two independent schools and Vojtěch Šafařík was appointed professor of general and analytical chemistry at the newly established Chemical Chair. Another prominent figure at the Department of Analytical Chemistry was Professor František Čůta (1898-1986). The Department of Physical Chemistry follows up the tradition of this field which was brought to fame by Jaroslav Heyrovský (1890-1967), Professor at Charles University and the 1959 Nobel Prize winner for chemistry. The most outstanding figures who worked in this field at the Institute of Chemical Technology, Prague included Professors Emerich Erdös (1922-1998) and Eduard Hála (1919-1989).
