This is the first chemE class that I feel I've really learned something useful and practical. I really liked the Professor Lu's Lecture. It was very straight forward and easy to understand. He also really cared about student learning in his class and always tried to answer our question in the class or in his office hour. Like other reviews said the hw in this class was pretty time consuming, but it was very helpful to prepare for tests. Even though hw required Matlab code, it wasn't hard to do that because we could use a same code to do other problem. Unfortunately, the last lecture was canceled due to the fire alarm, and all the classes was cancelled at UCLA , so It wasn't Pr. Lu's fault. In general, this class was pretty good and organized. Even though the subject of this course is hard, the instructor made it easy to understand. So, in order to do well in this class, I really suggest to really learn hw and lecture notes.

Similar to the previous review, the workload is pretty heavy. It started out okay but then started heavily involving programming (Matlab or Polymath). The amount of work was sometimes ridiculous; however, a lot of it was altering the same code to generate various plots/graphs. If you changed your perspective on the hw, it was actually a decent way to let the concepts sink in and a good learning tool to practice problems with. I just wish there was less of the Matlab/Polymath since it is not supposed to be a computing course.

Besides the hw, I thought the exams were fair - starts out easy, then a medium problem, and then 1 problem that makes you think a little bit more. If you did the hw and actually understood the concepts behind them, then the exams were not bad at all. In my opinion, Lu was more straight-forward than a lot of other professors. The TAs (or at least 2 out 3) were great and would love to have them again if given the chance. They were concerned with the students learning, responsive to emails, and gave hints out for the exams during discussion sections.

If you want to do well in this course though, make sure to read the book as well as review lecture materials. I wouldn't mind having Lu again for another course. He just needs to cut down on hw.

Professor Lu is a great guy. He really cares about his student learning. His homeworks can be long though, and his tests are hard but have lots of typos. The midterm and final were both rough. He is very flexible and moved our final by demand.

To echo someone else's review, this class is very practical. As such, the material is pretty straightforward. You learn about types of chemical reactors and how to determine some characteristics about those reactors--CSTRs, PFRs, PBRs, batch, etc. After finishing the core fluid/heat/mass transfer classes, this one will feel comparatively simpler, but the workload manages to stay high largely due to using numerical (explicit euler) methods to calculate parameters of some reactor. Get comfy with MATLAB.
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Lu is a fine professor. He absolutely has a hard accent, but I feel like once you're able to get past that, the lectures are pretty average. I have had Lu for an elective before and he was able to keep my attention the entire 2 hrs, which is the mark of a good lecturer. But truthfully, I rarely attended the Zoom lectures. This is because the textbook is REALLY good. "Elements of Chemical Reaction Engineering" was written by an author that treats me like the dumbass I am--I love it. It's written very laid-back and sarcastically--it's not dry at all and you might even end up doing a chemical engineering problem with Breaking Bad references about meth synthesis. Cool. If they change the book, ditch whatever they're using and pick up Fogler's textbook--highly recommend it. Otherwise, notes (but not videos) are posted online. I do have two criticisms--Lu is VERY slow to respond to emails, so rely on the TAs for anything important. Luckily had great TAs this quarter. Also, would like more transparency for the homeworks. If you do not attend lecture like me, you'll often get a self-induced surprise homework for a weekend. That's my own fault, but the worst thing is he made the last HW worth *over four times* the other homeworks with NO formal notification/email/CCLE post. Just, "surprise, this HW is worth about 8% of you final grade." That's probably the best incentive to attend class.
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Homeworks are tough, but if you do them, you're good for the exam. You're typically deriving a bunch of related differential equations and then iteratively using explicit euler to generate a bunch of graphs. Exams have you set up the equations, is open note, and honestly is not too difficult with good understanding of the course.
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Overall, the material for this course is straightforward, but the execution is often tedious. Lu is a solid professor, but I believe most professors will teach the class just fine--this is due to the book's quality/informality. My biggest piece of advice is to do the homework on your own (at least once on your own before exam day...), and actually read the book. One exam problem had us consider a chemical reaction A->B+C in a batch reactor--we had to derive the volume over time. However, the next problem had us consider C's evaporation over time--you wouldn't know where to start with that problem if you didn't know what each equation was saying.

Prepare yourself for some "rectal reactions" as we discuss the legendary fast food chain, "Paco Bell."

I did very well in this class. It is very methodical. However, the workload required by Lu in this class is ridiculous. He assigns homeworks that require the use of MATLAB, making each assignment around 30 pages long. Also, Lu seemed to enjoy assigning these sort of homeworks even during week 10 of the quarter.

Lu is easily the worst professor I had at UCLA. Keep in mind I did very well in this course, but I taught myself the material COMPLETELY ON MY OWN. Lu cancelled class for 3 weeks of the quarter, yet expected us to self-teach the material in his absence. During week 10, Lu left the country, cancelled the final lecture of the class right before the final exam, and told us to study the last chapter of the book on our own. Absolutely unacceptable. The TAs were extremely confused what he would test us on for the final exam. He refused to answer emails about certain topics, and did not show up to his office hours because he was out of town most of the time. I would say avoid this professor, but you have no choice if he teaches 106 the year you have to take. Horrible, horrible professor who made a class that much more difficult by making you self-study. Do every problem in the book, or at least the ones that are applicable and you will do fine on the exams (which have averages in the 50s).

If you're scared, you should be.

This is a fun, improvised sort of class that isn't too stressful. As Lu mentions, his goal is not to give you a hard time but instead to get you to learn a thing or two and this is exactly what he accomplishes.

Lectures are essentially mandatory. There's nothing posted online, no powerpoints, no real way to know what he went over unless you know someone in class. Homeworks are verbally given during class but they're honestly *really* open-ended. "How much energy do you need to turn 1 kg of gold ore into nano-sized particles 5 nm in diameter?" was an entire homework. Any method is fair game and so long as you make an attempt, the TA gives you a check. It's honestly refreshing to simply do some online research for a homework--you actually learn things this way. I simply did some research for the surface energy of gold, wrote down my sources, made some calculation assumptions and crunched numbers.

Another was to calculate how far water will crawl up a partially submerged piece of toilet paper. Explain it, actually do the experiment, research it, whatever. Just show some effort. Surprisingly, if I had the time, this prompted me to put more effort than I would have normally.

For how impromptu and improvised Lu's teaching style for this course is, the exams are surprisingly formal. Study for them. It's hard to say how to study since they aren't extremely difficult, but you definitely need to have attended lecture and paid attention to do well. Albeit, that isn't difficult to do. Some questions are easy plug and chug of fundamental equations Lu goes over in class. Others are essay-like where so long as you show you understood the basics in class, you'll get full marks. Some (especially the multiple choice) will leave you torn over how to answer.

Lectures are pretty cool. Minimal powerpoint and mostly Lu just teaching random topics within the subject. I don't even think we covered the stuff on the syllabus lol. Lu does have a heavy accent, but I found myself used to it pretty quickly. He'd ask open ended questions, wait for answers, draw diagrams on the board, derive equations, etc. Nothing too fast, crazy, or complicated, but that's honestly more than you can hope for at UCLA.

Overall, a very chill class. I wish all my classes were like this--not very dense, but enough there to keep you occupied.