IWMA announces 2019 Winner of the “Young Talent Award / Ph.D.”
The winner of this year’s “IWMA Young Talent Award / Ph.D.” is Dr. Topi Matti Sikanen. The title of his winning Ph.D. thesis is: “Simulation of Transport, Evaporation and Combustion of Liquids in large-scale Fire Incidents”.
In 2008, Dr. Sikanen started working for VTT, the Technical Research Centre of Finland, with a special focus on fire safety related topics. He defended his thesis in January 2018 at Aalto University. He says: “My research interests have been numerical simulation of fire phenomena, especially high-speed sprays and pool fires.” Dr. Sikanen currently works as a consultant for Fire Safety Design and Consultants Markku Kauriala Ltd.
“The audience in Berlin at the 19th International Water Mist Conference, which will take place on 23rd and 24th October this year, can look forward to the presentation of Dr. Sikanen’s thesis. As this year’s winner of the IWMA Young Talent Award he is invited to the conference as one of the speakers”, says IWMA General Manager Bettina McDowell.
Next year the award will once again go to the best master thesis. Submissions are to be handed in before 30th April 2020. Details can be found on the IWMA webpage.
First runner-up this year was Dr. Iqbal Mahmud. The title of his thesis: Simulation of the Suppression of Fires using Water Mist”.
Dr Mahmud wrote his Ph.D. thesis at Centre for Environment Safety and Risk Engineering (CESARE), Victoria University, Melbourne, Australia. His supervisors were Associate Professor Khalid Moinuddin and Professor Graham Thorpe. Dr. Mahmud’s work was based on efficiency of waster mists in the suppression of fire. He also carried out experiments on the characterization of water mists produced by single and multi-orifice high-pressure jet nozzles. Based on his work, he has published two journal articles and is expected to published three more in the near future.
