Technical Program

The Technical Program will include 74 speakers (22 invited) and close to 200 posters. There will be six themes spread over three days of technical sessions.

Technical Program  Download the Technical Program PDF

* Invited talks to be published as part of SEG Special Publication, No. 18 (available at a discounted price when you register).

Headshot of Robert M. Friedland

SEG Industry Outlook Dinner

Date: September 29, 2014 (Monday), 7:00 pm - 9:00 pm
Guest Speaker: Robert M. Friedland | Executive Chairman and founder, Ivanhoe Mines Ltd.
Talk Title: "Global Urbanization, Pollution and the Metals We Need"

Invited Presentations

Specimen of banded bonanza Au-Ag veins at Sleeper deposit in Nevada
Theme 1: Fundamental Advances in Economic Geology


Speaker: Massimo Chiaradia* | University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland

Co-authors: U. Schaltegger and R. Spikings

Talk Title: "Timescales of mineral systems — What have we learned in the past decade?"


Speaker: Robert Hazen* | Carnegie Institution of Washington, Washington, D.C., USA

Co-authors: X. Liu, R.T. Downs, J. Golden, E.S. Grew, G. Hystad, C. Estrada, and D.A. Sverjensky

Talk Title: "Mineral evolution: Episodic metallogenesis, the supercontinent cycle, and the co-evolving geosphere and biosphere"


Speaker: Clint Scott* | U.S. Geological Survey, Reston, VA, USA

Co-authors: J.F. Slack and K.D. Kelley

Talk Title: "The role of geobiology on the metallogenesis of sediment-hosted mineral deposits"


Speaker: Philipp Weis* | ETH Zürich, Zürich, Switzerland

Talk Title: "The physical hydrology of ore-forming magmatic-hydrothermal systems"


Speaker: Anthony Williams-Jones* | McGill University, Montreal, QC, Canada

Co-author: A.A. Migdisov

Talk Title: "Experimental constraints on the transport and deposition of metals in ore-forming hydrothermal systems"



Theme 2: Deposit Footprints


Speaker: Ravi Anand* | CSIRO / Minerals Down Under, Kensington, WA, Australia

Co-authors: M. Lintern, R. Noble, M. Aspandiar, C. MacFarlane, R. Hough, A. Stewart, S. Wakelin, B. Townley, and N. Reid

Talk Title: "Geochemical dispersion through transported cover in regolith-dominated terrains — Towards understanding the process"


Speaker: David Cooke* | University of Tasmania / CODES, Hobart, TAS, Australia

Co-authors: M. Baker, P. Hollings, G. Sweet, Z. Chang, L. Danyushevsky, S. Gilbert, T. Zhou, N. White, J.B. Gemmell, and S. Inglis

Talk Title: "New advances in detecting the distal geochemical footprints of porphyry systems — Epidote mineral chemistry as a tool for vectoring and fertility assessments"


Speaker: Ken Witherly* | Condor Consulting, Inc., Lakewood, CO, USA

Talk Title: "Geophysical expressions of ore systems, not deposits — Our current understanding" [Also presenting a post-conference workshop. See p. 4 of Second Circular for details.]


Carlin gold
Theme 3: Mineral System Science


Speaker: Hartwig Frimmel* | University of Würzburg, Würzburg, Germany

Talk Title: "A Giant Mesoarchean crustal goldenrichment episode: Possible causes and consequences for exploration"


Speaker: T. Campbell McCuaig* | University of Western Australia, Crawley, WA, Australia

Co-author: J.M.A. Hronsky

Talk Title: "The mineral system concept: Key to exploration targeting under cover"


Speaker: John Muntean | University of Nevada, Reno, NV, USA

Co-author: J. Cline

Talk Title: "The Carlin gold system: Applications to exploration in Nevada and elsewhere"


Coiled tubing rig
Theme 4: Innovations in Exploration Technology


Speaker: Paul Agnew | Rio Tinto, Bundoora, VIC, Australia

Talk Title: "Micro-analytical innovation for diamonds exploration and beyond"


Speaker: Doug Bryman* | University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada

Co-authors: J. Bueno, K. Davis, V. Kaminski, Z. Liu, D. Oldenburg, M. Pilkington, and R. Sawyer

Talk Title: "Muon Geotomography — Bringing new physics to ore-body imaging"


Speaker: Richard Hillis* | Deep Exploration Technologies CRC, Adelaide, SA, Australia

Co-authors: A. Baensch, J.S. Cleverley, D. Giles, S.W. Halley, B.D. Harris, S.M. Hill, P.A. Kanck, S.P. Soe, and G. Stewart

Talk Title: "Coiled tubing drilling and real-time sensing — Enabling "prospecting drilling" in the 21st Century?" [Also presenting a pre-conference workshop. See p. 3 of Second Circular for details.]


Speaker: Mark Jessell* | University of Western Australia, Crawley, WA, Australia

Co-authors: L. Aillères, E. de Kemp, M. Lindsay, F. Wellmann, M. Hillier, G. Laurent, T. Carmichael, R. Martin

Talk Title: "Next generation 3D geological modelling and inversion"


Drill rigs are at Beeshoek - Fe-Mn in South Africa
Theme 5: Exploration Management and Targeting


Headshot of Randall Oliphant

Speaker: Randall Oliphant | Executive Chairman, New Gold, Toronto, ON, Canada | Chairman of the World Gold Council

Talk Title: "What does the global exploration industry need to deliver in the 21st Century? — A shareholder's perspective"

Speaker: Richard Schodde | MinExCo, South Yarra, VIC, Australia

Talk Title: "The global shift to undercover exploration — How fast? How effective?"


Speaker: John Sykes* | Curtin University, Perth, WA, Australia

Co-author: A. Trench

Talk Title: "Finding the copper mine of the 21st Century: Conceptual exploration targeting for hypothetical copper reserves"


Speaker: Kaihui Yang | Zijin Mining Group, Xiamen, China

Talk Title: "Mineral exploration industry in China"


Chuquicamata, Chile, the world's largest open-pit copper mine
Theme 6: Case Studies of 21st Century Exploration Success


Speaker: Graham Brown* | Anglo American, London, UK

Talk Title: "Anglo American Exploration — Key ingredients to a decade of success"


Speaker: David Broughton | Ivanhoe Mines Ltd., Vancouver, BC, Canada

Co-authors: D. Kirwin, W. Hayden, and R.E. Flood

Talk Title: "The Ivanhoe Group — Two decades of global discoveries"


Speaker: Mark Bennett* | Sirius Resources NL, Balcatta, WA, Australia

Co-authors: M. Gollan, M. Staubmann, and J. Bartlett, Motive

Talk Title: "Means and opportunity: Key factors in the discovery of the Nova-Bollinger magmatic Ni-Cu sulfide deposits of Western Australia"