Tania's research interests are advanced process control, automation, analytics and data science in mineral processing.
Tania Ledezma Torres holds a bachelor’s degree in Chemical Engineering and a master’s degree in chemical engineering with a mention in process control and automation from Universidad Técnica Federico Santa María (UTFSM), Chile. She studied and evaluated power draw models for her master’s thesis, a study that contributed to the development of a vibration sensor and software for estimating the balls and total filling levels in rotary mills (Patent n° 59907).
With over nine years of experience in the Chilean mining industry, Tania has held several key roles:
- As a Project Engineer, she formulated and executed projects for contests with an applied R&D profile of InnovaChile – CORFO
- At Centinela Mine (Antofagasta plc), she gained experience as a Process Engineer and later specialised in data processing.
Her key achievements include:
- Developing the company's strategic growth plan, business cases, bottleneck studies, technology benchmark, equipment sizing and process simulations
- Developing advanced analytics and leading machine learning initiatives to support decision making in operation.
In 2020, Tania joined the Quebrada Blanca Phase 2 Project (Teck Resources Limited) as an Advanced Process Control Engineer. Her responsibilities included:
- Reviewing and implementing conventional and advanced control logic for the concentrator
- Leading the evaluation of instrumentation and complementary technologies for process control
- Leading the development of Leak Detection Systems
- Maintaining and continuously improving the dynamic process simulation platform.
Throughout her career, Tania has maintained strong ties with academia, collaborating on publications with her UTFSM professors and promoting collaborative research between the mining industry and Chilean universities. As a Research Fellow at JKMRC, she is part of the Advanced Process Prediction and Control (APPCo) group. Tania's aim is to research, develop, and apply advanced control, computational analytics, and process simulation solutions that optimise processes in the mining industry.