Olivia Mejías González

Olivia Mejías is a Research Fellow in Mine Waste Geoscience at the W.H. Bryan Mining and Geology Research Centre within the Sustainable Minerals Institute, and a member of the ARC Centre for Critical Resources for the Future (CCRF). She is currently part of the Mine Waste Transformation through Characterisation (MIWATCH) research group, holds a Master’s degree in geometallurgy, and has recently submitted her PhD on indium mobility and transformation in mine waste environments.

Her research focuses on applying multi-scale characterisation approaches to investigate critical minerals in mine waste materials and acid mine drainage, with the aim of advancing understanding of their biogeochemical cycling and translating these insights into the development of sustainable mineral extraction and geometallurgical practices.

Olivia is a geologist (MSc) with over 10 years of industrial and research experience in geochemical and mineralogical characterisation across the mining value chain, from exploration and production geology to geometallurgy. Over the years, she has gained extensive experience applying geometallurgical approaches to Cu–Mo porphyry ores, advancing geochemical studies in Co-rich IOCG systems, and more recently characterising In-bearing mine wastes derived from Cu–Sn granite-related and Cu–Au VMS deposits.

She has experience with a range of analytical techniques, including LIBS, automated mineralogy (QEMSCAN, MLA, MapsMin), LA-ICP-MS, synchrotron-based XFM and XAS, atom probe tomography, and geochemical modelling.