Mining goes Digital

The conferences on ‘Applications for Computers and Operations Research in the Minerals Industry’ (APCOM) initially focused on the optimization of geostatistics and resource estimation. Several standard methods used in these fields were presented in the early days of APCOM. While geostatistics remains an important part, information technology has emerged, and nowadays APCOM not only focuses on geostatistics and resource estimation, but has broadened its horizon to Information and Communication Technology (ICT) in the mineral industry. Mining Goes Digital is a collection of 90 high quality, peer reviewed papers covering recent ICT-related developments in:- Geostatistics and Resource Estimation- Mine Planning- Scheduling and Dispatch - Mine Safety and Mine Operation- Internet of Things, Robotics- Emerging Technologies - Synergies from other industries - General aspects of Digital Transformation in MiningMining Goes Digital will be of interest to professionals and academics involved or interested in the above-mentioned areas.

Dr. Christoph Mueller, born 1963, after his engineering studies and an additional education in technical software engineering at Siemens got his PhD in Electronics and Telecommunications. Since 1992 Christoph Mueller works mainly with automation projects for mobile machinery in the raw material industries. From 1997 he is operating his own companies specialized on successfully turning innovations into operational benefits in major mining process optimization and machine automation projects. Currently, these companies in Germany and Poland are working mainly with functional safe machine automation, driver assistance systems and autonomous operation in areas as mining and tunneling, agriculture or airport equipment.Dr. Winfred Assibey-Bonsu BSc(Mining); PhD(Eng) Wits Univ.; EDP, Wits Business School, FSAIMM, MSACNASP. Current Position: Group Geostatistician and Evaluator, Gold Fields Ltd, Corporate Technical Services, Perth, Australia. Employment post PhD studies; Gold Fields of South Africa, 1991 to 1994; Gencor Limited, 1994 to 1998; Gold Fields Limited, 1998 to date. Winfred’s experience includes mineral resource assets assessment for mining companies as well as new business associated work including prospects in South Africa, Australia, South America, Zaire, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Philippines, Ethiopia, Tanzania, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Russia, Finland, Romania, Papua New Guinea. Winfred is a dedicated family man with wife and four children. He enjoys reading and soccer.Dr. Ernest Baafi holds PhD in Mining Engineering from University of Arizona, MS in Mining Engineering from Penn State University, US and BE, ACSM from Camborne School of Mines, Cornwall, UK. He is Associate Professor in Mining at University of Wollongong, Australia where he is currently the Academic Program Director in Mining Engineering. His primary field of research is the application of computers and operations research methodologies to system evaluation and design. His current research activities include geostatistical ore reserve estimation, mine system simulation, logistics and optimisation. He is the current Chair of the International Council of Application of Computers and Operations Research in the Minerals Industry (APCOM), representing the Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy (AusIMM) on the Council.Prof. Dr. Christoph Dauber. Born in 1954, Prof. Dauber has studied Mining Engineering at the RWTH Aachen, where he obtained his Ph.D. about refrigeration techniques for deep hard coal mines. 1982 he joined RAG, the biggest hard coal mining company in Germany, and started as a deputy and undermanager. An exchange of engineers gave him the opportunity to work for six month in two Australian coal mines. Seven years he acted as the production manager of the hard coal mines Ewald and Walsum, before he joined the central technical department. Being the responsible manager for central technical support and supply he initiated and accompanied a couple of operational inno