Advisory Council

Chair & President

Christine Blackmore CEnv CSci FIMMM

Vice-President

Mike Clinch FIMMM

Email:

[email protected]

Vice-President

Graham Ormondroyd FIMMM

Vice-President

Colleen Mann

Honorary Treasurer

Thomas Hill MIMMM

Email:

[email protected]

IOM3 CEO

Colin Church CEnv FIMMM

Chair - IOM3 Natural Materials Group

Parvez Alam

is currently a Reader in Mechanical Engineering at The University of Edinburgh, UK. He is a Fellow of the Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining, a Fellow of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Biology, a Chartered Mechanical Engineer, Chair of the Natural Materials Group: a Technical Community of the Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining, and an Adjunct Professor in the Faculty of Biology at Universitas Gadja Mada, Indonesia. He was awarded the 2012 Per Brahe Prize for his research in biomimetics, and became a Technology Academy of Finland Laureate for his work on coral-inspired crystal engineering in 2014, an award conferred by the Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences in Finland.

Parvez earned his Doctorate from the University of Bath in 2004 under the supervision of Dr Martin Ansell FIMMM, where his research focussed on mechanically characterising timber reinforcing and repair systems using bonded-in fibre reinforced plastics. He then moved to the Department of Chemical Engineering at Abo Akademi University, Finland, where he worked with Professor Martti Toivakka in the areas of paper science, mass flow, micromechanics, paper coatings, and multiphysics modelling. In 2013, he was awarded the title of Docent(Habilitation) from Abo Akademi University in Finland and built a research group in Composite Materials and Biostructures. This new trajectory led to a wide range of new and interesting discoveries in the area of comparative biomechanics, examples of which include: the biomechanical and kinematic characterisation of the tree-climbing, water-hopping fish (Periophthalmus variabilis) with colleagues from Universitas Gadjah Mada in Indonesia, the discovery of a spider species (Nephilengys cruentata) in Kenya that spins the world’s toughest recorded egg sac silk, the role of microstructure in guiding the passive decorating strategies of the crab Tiarinia cornigera, and work into the biomechanics of sperm whale bone architectures with colleagues at the University of Cape Town in South Africa.

After moving to Scotland, he held the post of Marie-Curie Very Experienced Researcher at The University of Edinburgh between 2016-18. During this tenure, he worked with Professor Conchúr Ó Brádaigh FREng FRSE on the fatigue modelling of carbon fibre reinforced composites for use in tidal turbine blades, and in addition, took a short sabbatical to travel to the Kalahari Desert in Namibia to learn Ju’Hoansi, one of the world’s oldest extant click-languages. While in Namibia, he also seized the opportunity to research the composite designs and manufacturing methods of Ju’Hoansi arrows, work that has since been publicly presented, and published in learned society magazines. After a second short sabbatical to gain a Professional Certificate in Innovation and Technology at MIT, he began his tenure as an academic at The University of Edinburgh, where he currently runs a group that conducts research on a broad range of interdisciplinary topics related to biomimetic design, mechanical metamaterials, comparative biomechanics, robotics, multi-body systems, and composites engineering. Some research highlights from his group at Edinburgh include: the development of 3D projected 4-polytopes as a new class of mechanical metamaterial, the morpho-mechanical characterisation of varanid lizard claw gripping efficiencies, the release of AInsectID – an open source artificially intelligent software for insect identification, and the design of a walking necro-robot beetle with the highest payload-ratio of any walking robot recorded to date. At Edinburgh, he also lectures courses on engineering design, having previously developed courses in composites engineering, computational modelling and biomimetics while in the Nordic and South East Asian regions. 

Chair, IOM3 Packaging Group

Jude Allan

Jude started as a packaging technologist at the drinks division of Mars before taking the experience of life as a client over to the world of a packaging design agency.

For almost 20 years Jude championed and led the production and creative operations at jonesknowlesrtichie as it grew from a London based packaging design agency to a global design business with offices in London, New York, Singapore and Shanghai.

Jude and her team were responsible for delivering creative packaging designs into market for a wide range of much-loved brands from global favourites to local heroes as well as launching new start-up brands.

Working closely with brands such as Budweiser, Mars, Molton Brown, McVitie’s, Dulux paints and Hippeas, she has a rich and varied experience of the packaging industry, the challenges of innovation and the needs of brand owners to respond to their consumers demands.

 In 2018 she took on the role of chief operating officer at a start-up engineering agency in London with a manufacturing and project management office in Shenzhen, China. She spent a frenetic eighteen months at RPD International professionalising the business and developing the skills of a young group of entrepreneurs and engineers.

Jude now chairs the IOM3 Packaging Group.

She has a BEng in Materials Science and the IOM3 Diploma of Packaging Technology.

Chair - IOM3 Polymer Group

Sally Beken

Sally Beken has been active in knowledge transfer and business support for the polymer community for over 20 years having joined Faraday Plastics (a networking organisation) in 2003. She previously worked in the medical industry developing polymer medical devices with new formulations to reduce impact on the ozone layer.  Having spent many years working with polymer experts she has an extensive personal network to draw upon from both the academic and business communities to facilitate the changes we need in the sustainability of polymeric materials and innovation for future polymer products. Her Ph.D. was in the modification and pyrolysis of polymer compounds, and she has an honorary role as Professor at Brunel University. Her current role at Innovate UK Business Connect includes strategic interventions to support and shape projects involving multiple stakeholders from the polymer supply chain from SMEs and academics to major retailers. She was deeply involved in the set-up of the £60m IUK Smart Sustainable Plastics Packaging challenge and has supported multiple polymer innovators during the challenge delivery phase. She founded and runs the UK Circular Plastics Network a community working to ensure that less plastics waste enters the environment or is sent to landfill.

Chair - IOM3 Applied Earth Science Group

Rob Bowell

Rob Bowell obtained BSc from Manchester and PhD from Southampton universities in the UK. Background in mining industry first in coal in the UK, then base metals and gold in Namibia, Ghana, South Africa, Tanzania and USA and tin-tungsten in Portugal. Has worked for SRK Consulting as a geochemist for 29 years applying mineralogy and geochemistry to solving engineering problems in mining and processing. Rob has been an IMM member since 1996 and a Fellow since 2014.  Also, a Fellow of the Society of Economic Geology, Geological Society of London and Association of Applied Geochemists where he held office of councillor, vice president, president and past president.  Also a member and charted chemist through Royal Society of Chemistry, Member of Mineralogical Society of Great Britain and the International Mine Water Association. Currently also registered as a professional geoscientist in Europe, Canada and Namibia.

Currently holds an adjunct professorship at Queens University, Ontario, Canada. Research interests in supergene oxidation of sulfide deposits, solution mining and hydrogeochemistry. When he is not working, he enjoys Tai Chi, hiking, walking an elderly dog,  gardening and mineral collecting.

Chair - IOM3 Defence Safety & Security Group

Duncan Broughton

Chair - IOM3 Elastomer Group

James Busfield

Chair - IOM3 Ceramics Group

Emma Claxton

Chair - IOM3 Mining Technology Group

Colin Comberbach

Chair - IOM3 Energy Materials Group

Judith Driscoll

Chair - IOM3 Minerals Processing & Extractive Materials Group

Hylke Glass

Chair - IOM3 Biomedical Applications Group

Paul Hatton

Chair - IOM3 Composites Group

Paul Hogg

Chair - IOM3 Materials Processing & Manufacturing Group

Mark Jolly

Chair - IOM3 Construction Materials Group

Flavie Lowres

Chair - IOM3 Energy Transition Group

Tony Palmer

Chair - IOM3 Iron & Steel Group

Jitendra Patel

Chair - IOM3 Non Ferrous & Light Metals Group

Cheryll Pitt

Chair - IOM3 Wood Technology Group

Morwenna Speer

Chair - IOM3 Adhesion & Adhesives Group

Ambrose Taylor

Chair - IOM3 Sustainable Development Group

Matthew Thomas

Chair - IOM3 Surface Technologies Group

Ping Xiao

Chair - IOM3 Materials Characterisation & Properties Group

Ben Xu

Student Grade

Hannah Hilton-Tapp

Hannah is a third-year PhD student at the University of Leicester, working in the Centre for Sustainable Materials Processing and Space Park Leicester, under the supervision of Dr Ramy Mesalam. Her research interests include surface finishing of materials, electrodeposition of nanocomposites and the production of thermoelectric devices for use in Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generators (RTGs).

She also sits on the Advisory Council for IOM3 as a postgraduate student representative.

Fellow Grade

Paul Withey

Member Grade

Lucy England

Member Grade

Jason Webb

Associate Grade

Caitlin Fitzpatrick

Student Grade

Sam Burdett MIMMM

Sam currently works as a Carbon Manager at Skanska UK in London. His work focuses on delivering life cycle assessments for building projects in the UK. He also provides technical expertise on materials, construction methods and the environmental impact of these. He studied Materials Science and Engineering at Imperial College London. Whist in his previous role at Sandberg, performing materials failure analysis for the construction and infrastructure, he completed a master’s in advanced Materials for Sustainable Infrastructure (2020-22) at Imperial. His research focuses on novel and existing construction materials with the goal of creating a unified dataset that highlights the most sustainable materials for use in industry.

Sam is a keen advocate for engineering and passionate about educating people new to the industry. He is involved with ZERO, an innovation focused industry group working together to change the industry from high carbon emissions to becoming part of the decarbonisation solution.

Outside of work Sam spends lots of time cycling and is currently building a gravel bike to take on off-road adventures!

Technician Grade

Vacancy

Affiliate Grade

Joanne Copping

Scotland Regional Representative

Tiziana Marrocco

North East Regional Representative

Darron Dixon

Email:

[email protected]

North West Regional Representative

Gemma Dixon

Email:

[email protected]

Midlands Regional Representative

Kate Fox

Email:

[email protected]

South East Regional Representative

Nilmini Dissanayake

South West Regional Representative

Peter Saxby

Email:

[email protected]

Overseas Regional Representative

Brendan Costello

Chair, Ably Different in Materials Minerals & Mining (ADM3)

Martin Griffin

Chair, Ethnic Minorities in Materials, Minerals & Mining (EMM3)

Ajay Kapadia

Chair, IOM3Pride

Avery Cunningham AIMMM

As someone who has been involved with IOM3 Pride since its inception, I am deeply committed to fostering spaces where everyone feels seen, supported, and celebrated. With a professional background in Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion (EDI), experience managing international volunteer groups, and a track record of initiatives to support underrepresented communities, I bring a wealth of expertise to this role. As the inaugural winner of the IOM3 Outstanding Contribution Award for EDI, I am driven by a passion for creating meaningful change and ensuring that IOM3 Pride is a space where all members can thrive. My vision is to expand our reach and impact by supporting members across all career stages, from students to seasoned professionals, in bringing their authentic selves to their work. This includes serving as a supportive space for our allies by offering guidance, answering queries, and fostering a culture rooted in intersectionality.

Key priorities include embedding intersectional values into our programming to ensure all members feel represented, leveraging data-driven strategies to address member needs and measure progress, and strengthening IOM3Pride’s role in driving initiatives and influencing policies that support LGBTQ+ individuals. Additionally, I aim to expand partnerships with organisations championing LGBTQ+ inclusivity in STEM, creating enriched opportunities for members to connect, share resources, and collaborate. Together, we can ensure that IOM3Pride remains a vibrant and empowered network that celebrates diversity and drives meaningful change within IOM3 and the broader STEM community.'

Chair, Student & Early Career Group (SECG)

Ilija Rašović

Chair, Women in Materials Minerals & Mining (WIM3)

Margaret Wegrzyn

Margaret finished a degree in Materials Science and Engineering, and a PhD in piezoelectric ceramics, both at the University of Manchester. Having successfully completed these, she went to work at Morgan Advanced Materials, where she developed a new dielectric material for power applications, technology analysis of additive manufacturing (3D printing) in ceramics, and subsequently moved into a commercial role in 2015 as New Business Development Manager of Ceramic Injection Moulding.

She then moved to the world of polymers as Business Development Manager at Zotefoams plc, developing material solutions for customers all over continental Europe in various markets from aerospace to sports to medical applications. She is currently International Sales Manager 3D printers specialising in ceramic and metal additive manufacturing, working with academia and industry.

Outside of work, Margaret trains and dances all over Europe with a Polish Dance group, enjoys travelling around the world and attends various sports events throughout the year.