Dr Mark Pownceby

Dr Mark Pownceby is a Principal Research Scientist with CSIRO's Mineral Resources Business Unit (Sustainability Program) where he fulfils the role of Team Leader (Iron Ore Geometallurgy).

Mark has been awarded a:
* • Bachelor of Science with First Class Honours from Monash University, Victoria, Australia in 1984
* • Doctor of Philosophy in Earth Sciences (Experimental Geochemistry) from Monash University, Victoria, Australia in 1990.

Mark's research expertise is in the field of solid state chemistry and mineralogy. He applies this expertise in research projects related to:
* • ilmenite characterisation and processing
* • characterisation of bulk iron ores and their sintered products
* • mineralogy of uranium ores
* • experimental phase equilibria

Background
Mark joined CSIRO in 1992 as a Research Scientist. Prior to joining CSIRO Process Science and Engineering he held a visiting research scientist position at the Bayerisches Geoinstitut, Germany, from 1989 to 1992.

Since joining CSIRO Mark has worked primarily in the Industrial Minerals Sector. He directs fundamental research to examine the influence of impurity elements and gangue minerals on processing minerals (ilmenite, rutile, zircon) found in heavy mineral sand concentrates. His work resulted in the development of electron microprobe-based techniques for characterising heavy mineral (HM) sands and their processed products. He has successfully applied this technique in the characterisation of mineral sands from Australian deposits in the Murray Basin, the Eucla Basin and southwest WA. He has also conducted extensive research on HM deposits from, Southern Africa, Indonesia, Bangladesh and South Korea. Mark also has considerable expertise in the processing of ilmenite-dominated HM sands using the Australian-developed Becher process. He has written a number of seminal reviews of existing operations and developed potential new processing approaches to existing hard-to-process ores.

Mark is currently a member of the Carbon Steel Futures Group where his major activities involve designing and completing an experimental program aimed at understanding the complex mineral assemblages formed during the sintering of Australian iron ores. He is also part of two projects investigating the formation of complex calcium ferrite sinter phases in processed Australian iron ores and the geometallurgy of uranium ores. Within the Carbon Steel Futures Group Mark pioneered an innovative in situ diffraction capability that has been extensively applied to examining phase formation in iron ore sinter. This work has generated significant scientific output (5 high impact papers in past 3 years) as well as provided a scientific knowledge-based set of criteria that underpins the commercially important pot-grate sinter testwork programme at Pullenvale. Impacts resulting from the work have been: a) a detailed understanding of the sequence and mechanism of bonding phase formation in iron ore sinters; b) the effects of impurities (Mg, Ti) in iron ore, additives (ironsands, millscale) and sinter operating parameters (T, pO2, basicity) on bonding phase stability; c) the first ever thermochemical data generated for the sinter bonding phases SFCA and SFCA-I (critically needed for modelling melting reactions in the blast furnace), and; d) quantification of the effects of alumina contaminants in different iron ores. This latter work will have a significant impact on Australia’s iron ore industry as it demonstrates and quantifies, for the first time, why alumina present in kaolinite (as is the case in Australian ores), is advantageous towards forming and stabilising phases that promote high quality sinter.

Mark has previously led projects within CSIRO’s Light Metals Flagship to determine fundamental phase relations in solid-liquid systems designed to produce anhydrous magnesium chloride feedstock for the Australian Magnesium (AM) process and was Aluminium Cluster Leader for projects aimed at:
- developing new generation SiC refractory materials for sidewall linings of aluminium cells,
- the development of novel spinel materials for potential sidewall applications
Mark is currently the CSIRO/KIGAM Global Project manager responsible for developing joint projects, scientific exchanges, delivery of targeted training courses and an annual joint symposium. In this role he has developed training courses on Process Mineralogy (2013) and Mineral Sands Processing (2015)

Mark has authored and co-authored more than 170 technical papers in journals and conferences and more than 150 technical reports. He is currently an Adjunct Associate Professor at RMIT University and an Adjunct Professor at Swinburne University.