On Thursday, August 29th, the Ph.D. student in Mine Engineering of Delphos Laboratory, Fabián Manríquez, satisfactorily took his qualification exam, with his preliminary draft thesis, entitled: Simulation-optimization methodology for short-term planning in underground mines, before a commission made up of Drs. Raúl Castro, Xavier Emery, and Nelson Morales.

Thanks to his outstanding defense, Fabian was approved to develop his Ph.D. thesis in the area of mine planning. It should be remembered that the Qualification Exam aims to verify that the student has achieved sufficient skills and prof dominion to develop his doctoral thesis in the discipline of Mine Engineering.

Fabián is currently conducting a ten-week research internship at the Federal University of Ouro Preto (UFOP) in Minas Gerais, Brazil. The work calls for the generation of short-term production plans in open pit mines, optimizing the following objectives: maximizing the saturation of the processing plant's capacity, minimizing deviations from feed-to-plant grades, and minimizing transfers of load equipment between phases. In addition, the work calls for the development of cases of study of iron mines of the mining company Vale. This work is co-directed by Professor Dr. Carlos Arroyo (UFOP) and Dr. Nelson Morales of DELPHOS Laboratory.

Congratulations, Fabian, for this important milestone in your career! Now to finish the thesis.