Home > Our commitment to research > Our key areas
Our key areas
IFP’s teams have earned international acclaim for their work spanning the full breadth of oil and gas industry – and the alternative solutions that will replace them.
Our teams channel fundamental and applied research towards industrial development in the nine technical areas that provide the framework for their work. These areas follow:
- Earth Sciences
- Reservoir Engineering
- Applied Mechanics
- Physics and Analysis
- Catalysis and Separation
- Chemistry and Physical Chemistry
- Process Development and Engineering
- Engines
- Computer Science and Applied Mathematics
Earth Sciences
IFP is one of the world’s top-two petroleum-geochemistry and basin-modeling software developers. It has also come to rank among the leaders in the fields of sedimentology and structural geology, and is proactively developing organic and mineral geochemical research. In all these fields, the goal is to forecast CO2 storage behavior.
>> The Geology-Geochemistry-Geophysics Division
Reservoir engineering
IFP has ranked among the world’s chief laboratories dealing with multiphase flow in porous media since the 1960s. Its complex reservoir simulations, involving grids encompassing several million elementary meshes, are regarded as particularly authoritative. Expertise in these fields proves is mainly channeled towards CO2 re-injection into the subsoil.
>> The Reservoir Engineering Division
Applied Mechanics
IFP has been working on advanced fluid-mechanics modeling since the 1990s – and has grown into one of the leading software developers in this field. Our teams are also researching composite-material resistance and behavior under fatigue. More recently, efforts to channel this research towards new energy technologies spawned applications in CO2 and hydrogen transport.
>> The Applied Mechanics Division
Physics and Analysis
X-ray diffraction, sweep electronic microscopy, Castaing probes and GC-MS are a few examples from the range of state-of-the-art processes that IFP uses to study solids and fluids. The two-dimensional chromatography methods that IFP has developed rank it among the leading international laboratories in that field.
>> The Physics and Analysis Division
Catalysis and Separation
IFP has opened up original pathways for research on homogeneous catalysis stemming from Yves Chauvin’s findings, and is working on heterogeneous catalysis with high-throughput experiment protocols. It has also earned acclaim for its grasp of competitive-adsorption phenomena in microporous solids used for complex separation or CO2 capture.
>> The Catalysis and Separation Division
Chemistry and Physical Chemistry
IFP’s research on molecular simulation applied to industrial issues – spanning heterogeneous and homogeneous catalysis, adsorption and other fields – can be fittingly described as pioneering. IFP is also involved in research on colloid physics and chemistry, and on electrochemistry. Its work on the biotechnology front also ranks it among the leaders in the fields of pollution abatement and biofuels (conversion of lignocellulosic biomass, mainly).
>> The Applied Chemistry and Physical Chemistry Division
Process Development and Engineering
IFP teams use advanced CFD and chemical-kinetics modeling techniques, then compare their findings with original experimental data to understand moving-bed and fluidized-bed conditions. Complex-separation and CO2 capture mechanisms also rank high on IFP’s research agenda.
>> The Process Experiments Division
>> The Process Modeling and Design Division
Engines
IFP’s publications on 3D modeling of turbulent aerodynamics and combustion in engines are unanimously regarded as authoritative. Our teams are also working on new combustion modes (HCCI and CAI) to enhance efficiency while reducing gas emissions. They are likewise conducting advanced research on the engine-fuel couple in general and on biofuel behavior in engines in particular.
>> The Energy Applications Techniques Division
Computer Science and Applied Mathematics
IFP’s work on model reduction and optimization has led to solutions in real-time engine control and chemical kinetics. IFP has also developed a cluster of processors operating in a Linux environment, which has brought about a quantum leap in versatility.
>> The Technology, computer science, and applied mathematics Division