Providing a coordinated approach to materials design, creation, characterisation and application.

Advanced materials for applications across industry including ceramics, organics, biomaterials, smart material and fabrics, composites, polymers and light metals.

A new CSIRO research centre focused on developing economic, environmentally and socially sustainable processes for Australia’s minerals industry was officially opened today.

Despite the unprecedented downturn facing Australia’s minerals industry now is the time to invest in strategic research and development, according to CSIRO Minerals Chief Dr Bart Follink.

The Seventh International Conference on Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) in the Minerals and Process Industries (CFD2009) is the premier event for the industry.

CSIRO is helping enhance the competitiveness of Australia’s minerals industry by improving the performance of existing mineral processing operations and developing new ways to extract value from low-grade or complex ores.

CSIRO gold program researchers are helping industry improve efficiency and reduce gold solution losses by improving their understanding of carbon management and the impact of impurities on adsorption circuits. 

CSIRO is working with industry to increase recovery rates, improve the handling of valuable metals and enhance operational practices.

We apply our expertise in process development, integration, evaluation and scale-up to design new, and improve existing, equipment and processes.

A new method to mine gold without the expense of digging and crushing ore is being developed by CSIRO for use in areas not suited to conventional mining. (5:59)

Nature is lending a hand in the exploration of minerals with termites, trees and kangaroo poo becoming useful indicators of what lies hidden beneath the ground, without the need for expensive and sometimes environmentally damaging drilling. (3:41)

Dr Paul Breuer leads research in processing and environmental issues related to gold cyanidation.

Dr Matthew Jeffrey leads research into extracting precious metals from complex ores. He focuses on improving the current cyanidation process for recovering gold from ores, and developing alternative technologies for the gold industry.

CSIRO’s earthmatters magazine is a free magazine, published three times a year which focusses on the hard issues faced by today’s exploration and mining industries.

Minerals Down Under e-newsletters help keep subscribers up-to-date with the latest research results along with information on many of the critical people working with the Minerals Down Under National Research Flagship.

This fact sheet explains how Minerals Down Under Flagship researchers are examining sustainable processing through systems innovation. (2 pages)

The many advantages of solution processing have seen hydrometallurgy become a significant technology in the production of a range of valuable commodities such as alumina, base metals, gold, mineral sands and uranium. (8 pages)