Dr. Manoj Kumar Jena is a postdoctoral research fellow in the School of Chemical and Environmental Engineering, RMIT University, Melbourne, Australia. Dr. Jena obtained his Ph.D. from Curtin University, Perth, Australia, in joint association with the Indian Institute of Technology (Indian School of Mines), Dhanbad, India. His research interests include understanding reaction kinetics, fluidized bed reactors, clean technologies, application of waste material (waste to energy), the advancement of thermal technology, and smart carbon materials synthesis and characterization. Dr. Jena completed his Bachelor of Technology and Master of Technology in chemical engineering from Indira Gandhi Institute of Technology, Odisha, India, and the Indian Institute of Technology (Indian School of Mines), Dhanbad. He received the Indian Institute of Chemical Engineers Ambuja's Young Researcher's Award in 2017 for outstanding research work while studying for his Master's. Dr. Jena also has industrial experience as an engineer, working on computational projects. Dr. Jena has published five research articles as the first and corresponding author and has presented his work at national and international conferences and symposiums.
Professor Hari Vuthaluru completed his Ph.D. from the University of Newcastle on the pre-treatment of coal for remediation of ash-related problems in power utilities. Before commencing research work in Australia, he completed both Bachelor’s and Master’s Degrees in India and gained invaluable experience in several roles with Engineers India Ltd, Delhi. He is a Professor at the Western Australia School of Mines: Minerals, Energy and Chemical Engineering, Curtin University, and has worked as a Course Coordinator for 14 years for all graduate programs in the Department of Chemical Engineering. For the last several years, Dr. Vuthaluru has made extensive contributions to coal and biomass combustion research at national and international levels. His specific research interests include optimization of power utility equipment and chemical process units through CFD modeling, design and commissioning of bench-/pilot-scale facilities for coal conversion processes, ash-related issues in power utilities, desalination, and predictive tools for oil and gas industries, which include NTPC-India, BHEL-India, PT Berau and West Java power utility in Indonesia, Energy Research Foundation and KEMA in Holland and CSIRO, ACIRL, University of Newcastle, Wesfarmers Coal and Transfield Worley in Australia. Dr. Vuthaluru is a co-author of the books Flow Assurance of Crude Oil (Springer, 2023) and Parabolic Trough Solar Collectors: Thermal and Hydraulic Enhancement Using Passive Techniques and Nanofluids (Springer, 2022). He has published six book chapters and over 240 articles (refereed journal papers, conference papers, and industrial reports). He is an editorial board member of Fuel Processing Technology, The Open Fuels & Energy Science Journal, and the Journal of Chemical and Process Engineering. He is a Fellow of the Institute of Chemical Engineers (IChemE) and a lifetime Senior Member of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE).