Shugang Li, Ph.D., Professor, PhD mentor, Chairman of the executive committee of International Mine Ventilation Congress (IMVC), Vice President of Xi'an University of Science and Technology. Pro. Li is candidate for the national million talent project, the national outstanding mid-aged experts, and enjoys the Special Allowance from the State Council. He is currently member of the Academic Degrees Committee of the State Council in Safety Science and Engineering, executive director of the China Occupational Safety and Health Association, and member of the National Safety Production Emergency Experts Group. He has long been engaged in the teaching and research of co-extraction of coal and gas, mining induced strata control. He has been in charge of 7 national projects, such as special instrument projects and key projects funded by the National Natural Science Foundation, nearly 10 provincial projects, more than 30 projects supported by industry. He has received one of the 2nd National Prize for Progress in Science and Technology, two of the 2nd National Prize for Teaching, more than 10 provincial or ministerial awards. He has published more than 300 academic papers and more than 30 national patents. He has published 5 monographs such as "Introduction to the Co-extraction of Coal and Methane", etc., and edited 11 textbooks such as "Disaster Science" and "Principle of Safety Science", etc..

John Rowland has 43 years coal industry experience starting out as a mine surveyor then moving into production to Undermanager in charge level. Pursuant to the Moura 2 mine explosion John completed the Grad Dip in Mine ventilation at UNSW and opened his own ventilation based consultancy “Dallas Mining Services” around 20 years ago. John specialises in ventilation design as has done considerable work around the Asia pacific region. He is best known for collecting underground data and fabricating or rebuilding mine ventilation models for numerous clients. Over the last 10 years John has been working with the author of this paper Dr Roy Moreby primarily on life of mine and ventilation planning using Ventsim software and currently both are working on the Pike River Recovery Project.

Dr Martin Griffith is an engineer and developer at Howden Ventsim in Brisbane Australia. He holds a PhD in Mechanical Engineering and fluid dynamics and has over 12 year's experience working with numerical simulation on a range of engineering topics. He has been with VentSim for 2.5 years, working on simulation methods, new applications and training.