Vice chancellor of University of Leeds, Richard A Williams visited Institute of Process Engineering, Chinese Academy of Sciences (IPE-CAS) on invitation from February 24-25. He was appointed to IPE honorary professor and Li Jinghai, vice president of CAS awarded the appointment letter to doctor Williams.

After the ceremony, doctor Williams gave a lecture “digital measurement and digital simulation of particulate processes” to introduce his scientific achievements on tomography. The lecture described recent advances in the use of information derived from three dimensional micro-tomographic imaging and laser scanning technology.

Li Jinghai and doctor Williams held a discussion on the arrangement of “energy storage and policy workshop” of China and Britain. They established basic framework of the workshop and reached an agreement that IPE will undertake the workshop.

Directors of IPE communicated with doctor Williams for advice and suggestions of the cooperation. IPE hope to get more international cooperation with University of Leeds in the future, including strategies, sciences and technologies, talents, information sharing and administration. CAE member, Zhang Yi, doctor Williams and IPE professors also exchanged for the research progress on interested fields. Prof. Williams visited the laboratories of IPE after the conference.

Richard A Williams is a professor of Mineral and Process Engineering at University of Leeds and is also Pro Vice Chancellor for International Partnerships. He is a visiting professor at UNSW, Sydney. He graduated from Imperial College and after research and work experience with Anglo American corporation and De Beers became lecturer in Chemical Engineering at UMIST (Manchester). He has held posts at the University of Exeter and University of Leeds. At Leeds he founded the Institute of Particle Science and Engineering. He works in on-line process instrumentation (tomography), emulsion technology, particle and mineral, separation, nanoparticles manufacturing and in nuclear waste disposal. He has received several awards and prizes relating to his own innovation in chemical engineering in the area of personal products manufacturing, process measurement, nuclear decommissioning and energy systems. He is a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering and a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Science & Technology. He was awarded OBE for services to science and engineering in 2009.