International travel generously provided by Qantas

Dr. Thomas began his professional career as a research scientist with the Lockheed Aeronautical Systems Company, Marietta, Georgia, in 1977. At that time he was responsible for experimental investigations into the control of fluid dynamic instabilities and aircraft drag. In 1980, he was appointed Principal Aerodynamic Scientist to the company and headed a research team examining various problems in advanced aerodynamics and aircraft flight test. This was followed in 1983 by an appointment as the head of the Advanced Flight Sciences Department to lead a research department of engineers and scientists engaged in experimental and computational studies in fluid dynamics, aerodynamics and aeroacoustics. He was also manager of the research laboratory, the wind tunnels, and the test facilities used in these studies. In 1987, Dr. Thomas was named manager of Lockheed’s Flight Sciences Division and directed the technical efforts in vehicle aerodynamics, flight controls and propulsion systems that supported the company’s fleet of production aircraft. In 1989, he moved to Pasadena, California, to join the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) and, shortly after, was appointed leader of the JPL program for microgravity materials processing in space. This NASA-sponsored research included scientific investigations, conducted in the laboratory and in low gravity on NASA’s KC-135 aircraft, as well as technology studies to support the development of the space flight hardware for future Shuttle missions.

Dr. Thomas was selected by NASA in March 1992 and reported to the Johnson Space Center in August 1992. In August 1993, following one year of training, he was appointed a member of the astronaut corps and was qualified for assignment as a mission specialist on Space Shuttle flight crews. While awaiting space flight assignment, Dr. Thomas supported shuttle launch and landing operations as an Astronaut Support Person (ASP) at the Kennedy Space Center. He also provided technical support to the Space Shuttle Main Engine project, the Solid Rocket Motor project and the External Tank project at the Marshall Space Flight Center. In June 1995 Dr. Thomas was named as payload commander for STS-77 and flew his first flight in space on Endeavour in May 1996. He next trained at the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center in Star City, Russia in preparation for a long-duration flight. In 1998, he served as Board Engineer 2 aboard the Russian Space Station Mir for 130 days. From August 2001 to November 2003, Dr. Thomas served as Deputy Chief of the Astronaut Office. Dr. Thomas completed his fourth space flight on STS-114 and has logged over 177 days in space. He is currently working issues for the Exploration Branch of the Astronaut Office.

Professor Malcolm Allan, PhD, BSc(Hons), MIET, CEng, Dean of the School of Engineering and Computing, Glasgow Caledonian University, UK 

Professor Allan is currently Dean of the School of Engineering and Computing at Glasgow Caledonian University. The School has more than 1800 students, including 350 international students, circa 100 academic staff and offers bachelors, masters and research postgraduate programmes. Having graduated from the University of Strathclyde, Glasgow in 1976 with a 1st class honours degree in Electrical and Electronic Engineering his early postgraduate career commenced in electrical machine design (Parsons Peebles) followed by a period in technical sales and marketing (Eaton Cutler Hammer). This was followed by the position of Technical Director (J Allan & Co) in 1981 with responsibility for leading on design and development. In 1985 he joined Glasgow Caledonian University (then Glasgow College of Technology) as a lecturer in electrical engineering and also achieved registration as a Chartered Engineer with the Engineering Council (UK). His main subject interests are in electrical drives and power electronics. This is underpinned with research which focuses on developing novel techniques for optimising, the performance of electric drive systems. In 1994 he completed a PhD in collaboration with Ferranti and has published several papers at national and international level in the area of electric drives. In 2000 he was appointed to the position of the Director of Quality and Standards (Head of Learning, Teaching and Quality - 2007) and continued in this role until 2008. He has instigated and led several major international collaborative ventures aimed at curriculum and pedagogical development and is a visiting professor to universities in Germany and Greece. In 2007 he was appointed to the Chair of Learning and Teaching. He is regularly invited to peer review engineering education and in 2008 was invited to join a United Nations team to review engineering education in Arab Universities. He has published, since 2000, 5 journal papers and 20 conference papers including several keynotes in the area of Engineering Education.

Professor Peter Dowd, Dean of the Faculty of Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Computer and Mathematical Sciences, The University of Adelaide

Professor Peter Dowd has more than 30 years experience in academic research, teaching and administration and in consulting to industry. His research interests include geostatistical modelling and prediction in mineral resource, petroleum reservoir and environmental applications; geological modelling and mathematical geology; stochastic modelling and quantified risk assessment in natural resource and environmental applications; definitions and reporting of ore reserves; mineral economics; financial analysis and modelling; operational research; and computer-aided mine design. The context of much of this work has been the modelling and estimation of orebodies, coal deposits and hydrocarbon reservoirs, often in very complex geological settings; the generation of three-dimensional orebody models as the basis for optimal mine design and scheduling; establishing resources and reserves together with associated confidence limits; the design of blasting and loading operations to optimise mineral extraction; and the quantification of geological and technical risk associated with resource extraction. Recent work (since 1996) has focussed on the characterisation of rock masses for environmental risk analysis and assessment and for mining applications. Professor Dowd’s contributions to the development and application of geostatistics were recognised by the Royal Academy of Engineering in 1998 when he was elected to Fellowship of the Academy. The citation particularly noted his “distinguished international contributions” to the application of geostatistics in mine planning and design. In 2006 he was elected Fellow of the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering in recognition of his contributions to geostatistics and for leadership in engineering education. He has consulted extensively in geostatistics and mineral economics to the mining industry in Africa, Australasia, Europe, North America and South America and the petroleum industry in the UK and Saudi Arabia. Consultancies include ore reserve estimation, reporting of reserves, mine planning, geological modelling, feasibility studies, valuation, input to the development of mining codes and assessment of the micro- and macro-economic effects of mining taxation systems. These consultancies have included evaluations of many of the world’s major orebodies and mineral deposits, particularly in Australasia, Europe and the Americas. He has published over 180 papers and parts of books in the fields of geostatistics, stochastic modelling and spatial statistics, operational research, computer-aided mine design, mine finance and valuation and has developed commercialised software products for the minerals industry.