Search
Close this search box.

Board of Directors

MetSoc Board of Directors

The Board of Directors is composed of MetSoc members and volunteers who are dedicated to supporting the society by assisting in the planning of community activities, webinars, events and conferences.

The Board is made up of three groups:

Executive Board

The Executive Board consists of the Immediate Past President, President, Vice-Presidents, Treasurer and Secretary.

View The Executives

Technical Sections

The Technical Sections represent the technical diversity of the metals, minerals and materials community.

View The Sections

Standing Committees

These committees are dedicated to the various services of the society such as membership, students, EDI, publications, etc.

View The Committee

MetSoc Executive Board

Dimitrios Filippou

President

RioExpert Metallurgist, Rio Tinto Iron & Titanium

Read Bio

Roki Fukuzawa

Immediate Past President

Specialist, Hatch

Read Bio

Julie Lévesque

1st Vice-President

R&D project manager, Centre de métallurgie du Québec

Read Bio

Lukas Bichler

2nd Vice-President

Professor, University of British Columbia

Read Bio

Niels Verbaan

3rd Vice-President

Director, SGS 

Read Bio

Greg Richards

Treasurer

Teck Metals, Retired

Read Bio

Jessica Hiscocks

Secretary

KPM

Read Bio

MetSoc Technical Section Chairs

Brittany MacKinnon

Sustainability

Process Engineer-Pyrometallurgy, Hatch

View Section

Cinziana Sist

Hydrometallurgy

Specialist Metallurgist, Hatch

View Section

Abdallah Elsayed

Light Metals

Professor, University of Guelph

View Section

Gaofeng Li

Materials

National Research Council Canada

View Section

Jean-François Boulanger

Minerals Science & Engineering

Professor, Université du Québec en Abitibi-Témiscamingue

View Section

Elmira Moosavi

Pyrometallurgy

Associate Professor, École de technologie supérieure (ÉTS)

View Section

MetSoc Standing Committee Chairs

Daniel Brosig

Business Development

Director, Energy Solutions at Gas Cleaning Technologies LLC

Learn More

Engin Ozberk

Historical Metallurgy

CIM Fellow

Learn More

Ahmet Deniz Baş

Publications

Associate Professor at MSKU, Turkey

Learn More

Sidney Omelon

Student Activities

Associate Professor, McGill University

Learn More

Georges Houlachi

Membership Services

Hydro Quebec, LTE lab
Learn More

Audrey Pothier

Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (EDI)

EIT, Rio Tinto

Learn More

Make a Lasting Connection

Become an active volunteer, a sponsor, donate to our student fund, or advertise with MetSoc.

Support Us

MetSoc is a constituent society of the Canadian Institute of Mining, Metallurgy and Petroleum (CIM).

Newsletter Sign Up

Contact Us

Suite 1040, 3500 de Maisonneuve Blvd. W. Westmount, QC, Canada H3Z 3C1

Facebook Twitter Youtube Linkedin

© 2024 MetSoc of CIM.

Sitemap

Privacy Policy

Designed by Azuro Digital

Dimitrios Filippou, Eng., Ph.D. is a metallurgical engineer with extensive experience in metal extraction R&D, process upscaling and optimisation, life cycle assessment and technology strategy development. He holds a Dipl. Eng. from the National Technical University of Athens (1988) and a Ph.D. degree from McGill University (1994). Since 2003, he works for the TiO2 Products Group of Rio Tinto Iron & Titanium. Dimitrios maintains strong ties to professional and research communities. He served as Secretary and Chair of the Hydrometallurgy Section of MetSoc (2009-2016), and he co-chaired the symposium “Pressure Hydrometallurgy 2012.”

Roki Fukuzawa is a Specialist at Hatch with more than thirteen years of experience in the design and engineering of off-gas handling systems for metallurgical clients in copper, nickel, zinc and gold industries. She has worked on off-gas projects from conceptual studies to detailed engineering. Roki is the Chair of COM 2023.

Julie Lévesque is an R&D project manager at Quebec Metallurgy Center (CMQ), where she is the leader of the mechanical forming axis. She has close to 15 years of experience in the optimization of forming processes in collaboration with industries in the automotive, aerospace and packaging industry, amongst others.

Julie has been involved in MetSoc since 2017 as the Chair of the Light Metals technical section. She was the chair of the Light Metal Technology – Applications for the Transportation Industry at COM 2018 and a co-chair of other Light Metals symposiums at COM in 2019 and 2020. She is also active in her community, being a Women Ambassador of the Profession for the Ordre des ingénieurs du Québec (Quebec Professional Engineers order).

Dr. Lukas Bichler received his Ph.D. degree in Mechanical Engineering (specializing in Manufacturing, Materials and Solid Mechanics) from Ryerson University, Toronto. Upon graduation, he received NSERC-Postdoctoral fellowship, tenured at the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at the University of Toronto. 

RESEARCH SUMMARY: Advanced characterization of materials; New alloy development; Manufacturing processes 

COURSES & TEACHING: Manufacturing processes; Fundamental and advanced topics in materials science; Professional development (law and ethics for engineers)

Director, Technical Services (Hydrometallurgy), Metallurgy and Consulting​, SGS 

Niels Verbaan has over 20 years’ experience in the Minerals Industry. Having earned Master’s degrees in Raw Materials Processing (Delft University, The Netherlands) and Hydrometallurgy (McGill University), Niels started his career at Lakefield Research (now SGS) in 2000 as a Project Metallurgist.  In 2003-2004 he moved to Belgium and worked as an R&D Manager at Hydrometal, where he was responsible for evaluating new raw materials into the hydrometallurgical recycling facility.  He returned to Canada and re-joined SGS in 2004, and via various roles (Senior Metallurgist, Group Leader Hydrometallurgy, Principal Metallurgist, Technical & BD manager) settled into his current role as Director, Technical Services (Hydrometallurgy), Metallurgy & Consulting. In this role, he provides leadership and advice to SGS customers, SGS management, SGS global network of operations and sales teams on the technical aspects of SGS services involving hydrometallurgy of ores, concentrates and secondary feed streams for new and existing markets and commodities.  ​ 

Niels has authored or co-authored well over 40 technical publications and two patents related to the processing of critical materials. He has chaired biannual symposia on Processing of Critical Materials since 2014 and is currently chair for the “Joe Ferron Memorial Symposium – Processing of Critical Materials” as part of COM2024 in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada.​ 

Niels’ areas of expertise include general metallurgical process development, management of complex hydrometallurgical pilot plants, and data analyses and presentation to clients.  He offers expertise in a wide range of commodities, with a strong focus on rare earth elements, scandium, nickel, cobalt, vanadium, niobium and minor metals.​ 

Greg Richards graduated in metallurgical engineering from the University of British Columbia. He continued with the department, teaching process metallurgy and conducting research in non-ferrous pyrometallurgy. He later moved to Cominco Research, working in their metallurgical research group, and then to the technical services department of Trail Operations, Teck Metals Ltd. He recently retired from his position as superintendent of knowledge management, responsible for developing systems for the capture and transfer of critical business knowledge. He has served as a board member of the Metallurgy and Materials Society of CIM since 2007.

Jessica Hiscocks is a physical metallurgist who has done metallography and research on materials from Aluminum to Zirconium.  Her early work was in solid-state forming, including extrusion and friction stir welding, and her recent Post-Doc used computer simulation to optimize aluminum flow during sand casting.

Her current work involves the development of physical metallurgy services, research, and training at Kingston Process Metallurgy.  She aims to help create a hub of academic and manufacturing relationships in Kingston, promoting light metals and sustainability.

Other fields of interest include the development and promotion of open-source software for metallographic analysis purposes, and studying Japanese.