IChemE Fellows elected at RAEng's 40th AGM

ICHEME Fellows Mojtaba Ghadiri and Gary Lye have been elected to Fellowship of the Royal Academy of Engineering (RAEng).

A total of 50 of the “UK’s finest engineers” were elected following the Academy’s 40th annual general meeting, which took place on 8 September at the Royal College of Surgeons in London. New candidates are peer-nominated by two existing Fellows and are assessed by one of 11 Membership Selection Panels, specialising in a specific sector of engineering. Each panel is represented by existing Fellows from academia and industry. RAEng currently has over 1,500 Fellows.

Ghadiri, a professor of chemical engineering at the University of Leeds, was nominated for developing the underlying engineering science of particulate processes and products by advancing modelling and measurement techniques to analyse and predict behaviour in industrial systems. This has benefited industry processes such as grinding, agglomeration, electrostatics, spray drying, fluidisation, and cohesive powder flow, across bulk chemicals and formulated products for pharmaceuticals and consumers.

An example of his test methods includes assessing attrition, segregation, caking, flowability and triboelectrics (charging powers using small material quantities) in asthma inhalers and tablets.

“It is really a great honour to have been elected. It is the highest accolade one can get in the engineering profession. It is so rewarding to see that some of them were eventually and at long last recognised to constitute a notable contribution to the engineering profession,” Ghadiri told The Chemical Engineer.

Lye, professor and head of the biochemical engineering department at UCL, was nominated for his contributions to innovative teaching and skills development of future engineering leaders in the fields of biochemical engineering and bioprocessing. Also director of the EPSRC Centre for Doctoral Training in Bioprocess Engineering Leadership, Lye has pioneered research in novel discovery platforms for bio-based manufacture and their transfer into industrial practice.

“I’m particularly pleased that the nomination recognised our contributions to the training of early-career researchers, as they are the real future of the discipline,” he said.

Ghadiri and Lye join 48 other esteemed engineers across all engineering disciplines including honorary Fellow Thomas Heatherwick, founder of Heatherwick Studio. His designs – including the cauldron of the 2012 London Olympic Games and the Routemaster-inspired New Bus for London – are widely recognised, in addition to acclaimed buildings in Singapore, Hong Kong and Shanghai that have made creative use of materials to combine engineering, architecture and sculpture.

Dame Ann Dowling, president of RAEng, said: “I am delighted to welcome to our Fellowship 50 more of today’s very best engineering minds. From life-changing equipment revolutionising our hospitals to new tools that are enabling high-tech businesses to flourish, their work has delivered great value to society.”

Ghadiri and Lye also join IChemE Fellows Claire Adjiman and Nilay Shah, who were elected in 2015.

This month, RAEng also honoured former IChemE president Roger Sargent with the Sir Frank Whittle Medal, presented for outstanding and sustained achievement in engineering.

A full list of elected Fellows can be found here.