Jack completed his Bachelor of Mining Engineering degree with honours from the University of Queensland in 2013. Over the past decade, he has worked full-time in both open pit and underground operations across Australia and overseas, while undertaking a part-time PhD. He completed his PhD on optimising mining sequences for fully mobile in-pit crushing and conveying (FMIPCC) systems through mixed-integer programming, aiming to address the current gap in mine planning tools for such systems. He is now a senior mining engineer at Mining Plus.

Tim has over 10 years of experience having worked in several world-class mining operations across Australia. During his time in operations, he gained experience as an alternate underground manager, a ventilation officer and overseeing the mine planning department. Tim holds a completed a PhD titled "Planning and Optimisation Methods for Lunar In-Situ Resource Utilisation" which he completed at the University of New South Wales. His expertise also includes applied research and numerical modelling, as well as managing infrastructure projects such as underground dewatering systems and ventilation upgrades.

Mpeo Julia Mahase (Ms) is currently registered as a PhD candidate at the School of Mining Engineering at the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) and is also working in Australia, Central Queensland, as a mining engineer at the Coronado Curragh mine. She has a background in mining engineering (mine planning and optimisation) and is currently conducting research on mine planning and multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA). Mpeo graduated at Wits University (BSc Engineering - Mining) in 2014 and in 2017 she also graduated with an MSc Engineering (Mining – Mine planning and optimisation). She has previously published two journal papers in MCDA. Mpeo is registered as a Candidate Engineer with the Engineering Council of South Africa (ECSA) and as a professional engineer with Engineers Australia. She is also a member of the Southern African Institute of Mining and Metallurgy (SAIMM) and the Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy (AusIMM). She has also previously served as an external examiner of postgraduate MSc research theses at the Wits School of Mining Engineering. She is also mentoring a graduate mining engineer in Australia.

Fabián Manríquez León holds a Ph.D. in Mining Engineering (2020) from the University of Chile, where he also earned a Master’s degree in Mining (2015) and a Bachelor’s degree in Civil Mining Engineering (2015). He has held academic positions at Universidad Central, the University of Chile, and Universidad Católica del Norte. He is currently an Assistant Professor in the Department of Mining, Metallurgy and Materials Engineering at Universidad Técnica Federico Santa María, based at the San Joaquín Campus in Santiago, Chile. His teaching experience spans both undergraduate and graduate courses in areas such as mine planning, open-pit mine design, underground mining, mineral deposit evaluation, and loading and hauling systems. His research focuses on the application of mixed-integer linear programming for the generation and optimization of mining schedules, the optimized design of open-pit mines, and the simulation of mining systems.

Pathy Musema Muke holds a BSc (Honours) degree in Mining Engineering from the University of Lubumbashi, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), an MSc in Mining Engineering from the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits), Johannesburg, South Africa and is completing a PhD in Mining Engineering from Wits. He is a Junior Lecturer at Institut Supérieur des Techniques Appliquées (ISTA-Kolwezi), DRC, and is a member of the National Order of Civil Engineers of Congo (ONICIV). His research interests are in mine production scheduling and optimisation, and applied operations research. He has previously presented a paper at APCOM 2021 in Johannesburg, South Africa, which was based on the research work he conducted for his MSc.