Flotation '09 off to a good start

This morning was the first time that I have not opened an MEI Conference. The mantle was passed to Jon today who welcomed our delegates from 20 countries and our 12 sponsors. Over the next four days over 185 delegates will attend and discuss 78 presentations, in both oral and poster sessions.

The 4-day conference contains two 2-day symposia, the first dealing with the fundamental physics and chemistry of flotation, the second on applications and plant practice.

Jon introduced Prof. Dee Bradshaw, our consultant on fundamentals, who remarked that, although flotation is over 100 years old, we are still pondering its mysteries, and each flotation conference has been a defining process in advancing our knowledge of this complex process, with state of the art publications in Minerals Engineering. Peer review is critical to the advancement of knowledge and Dee called for voluntereers from the audience to aid in the review of conference papers.

Dee introduced Prof. Cyril O'Connor, the first keynote speaker, and well known to everyone in the flotation field. He first lectured to Dee when she was a teenager, and she is now a grandmother!

Cyril's keynote highlighted the complexity of flotation showing that the chemical reactions are still not fully understood, and are influenced by many factors.

I would like to invite all conference delegates, who will be following the blog postings over the next few days, to submit their own comments on the conference.