Mechanical process engineering is an engineering science that deals with dispersed systems. These are particles, droplets, and gas bubbles, i.e., fine and finest enclosed phases that have an interface with the surrounding phase. A particular focus of mechanical process engineering is on particle technology, which, as the name suggests, deals with solid particles in the size range from a few nanometers to several millimeters.

Particles are the basis of many products in our daily lives: a tablet consists of particles of the active ingredient and filler, a fertilizer is applied as coated solid particles, an instant beverage consists of a powder mixture, and in a lithium battery, the active materials of the electrodes are solid particles of metal oxide and graphite. Approximately 80% of all industrial products are solids, and in most processes, these solids were present in particle form at least once, either during the process or as a product. Thus, mechanical process engineering is an essential engineering science in our modern industrial society.

Mineral processing can be seen as a subfield of mechanical process engineering. It deals with mechanical processes for primary and secondary raw materials. Therefore, it has scientific and technical interfaces, for example, with the geosciences and metallurgy. Historically, mechanical process engineering, particularly through the work of Hans Rumpf in Karlsruhe and Heinrich Schubert in Freiberg, developed from mineral processing. In this tradition, we understand teaching and research here at the TU Bergakademie Freiberg: mechanical process engineering and mineral processing are thought of together.