Nick Green
University of Birmingham, UK

Nick Green is a Professor in Manufacturing Technology and received his PhD in Metallurgy from the University of Cambridge. His career has shifted several times between industry and academia, settling in academia since 2015 when he returned to the University of Birmingham as Founding Director of the High Temperature Research Centre and Professor of Manufacturing Technology.

Nick’s research interests lie in solidification and shape casting, but the title of his Chair at the University of Birmingham is very appropriate – as there are many enabling technologies that are equally important to manufacturing high integrity and high performance castings. Nick’s research group has ongoing work which spans; (i) fundamental characterisation of materials, (ii) solidification science, (iii) computational process modelling, (iv) experimental research and process development across the Technology and Manufacturing Readiness Levels.

Dr Owen Draper
Rolls-Royce plc, UK
Owen is Rolls-Royce plc’s Global process owner for Single Crystal (SX) casting. Owen gained his PhD in Investment Casting technologies from the University of Birmingham, in 1997.

Tomohiro Takaki
Kyoto Institute of Technology, Japan

Tomohiro Takaki is a Professor in the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering at Kyoto Institute of Technology (KIT), where he has served since 2007. In 2025, he was appointed Director of KIT’s newly established High-Performance Simulation Research Center (HPSRC). He received his B.S. in Maritime Science and his M.S. and Ph.D. in Engineering from the Kobe University of Mercantile Marine.

After earning his Ph.D., he began his research career in computational materials science and has since specialized in the phase-field (PF) method. His research focuses on large-scale simulations of microstructure evolution in metallic materials, including dendrite growth, grain growth, recrystallization, and related multi-physics phenomena. His work increasingly addresses solidification processes in complex systems such as metal additive manufacturing, as well as data assimilation that integrates PF simulations with in situ X-ray observations.

He has published nearly 180 journal papers, delivered 100 invited talks, and received 29 awards, including the 2011 ACM Gordon Bell Prize for large-scale dendrite growth simulations using the PF method on a GPU supercomputer and the 2022 MEXT Commendation for Science and Technology.

Raymond Monroe
Steel Founders’ Society of America, USA

Raymond W. Monroe joined the Steel Founders’ Society of America SFSA as Executive Vice President in 1988. He holds a B.S. in Chemical Engineering from Auburn University, an M.S. in Engineering Science from the University of Alabama (Birmingham), and a PhD in Manufacturing Engineering from Worcester Polytechnic Institute.

Raymond supports the U.S. Department of Defense as a panelist for the Joint Defense Manufacturing Technology Panel- Metals Sub-panel. This panel reviews the DoD MANTECH projects for advanced manufacturing. He is the instigator for the Steel Performance Initiative, a DoD program to invest in advanced specialty steel technology for U.S., domestic producers to meet strategic DoD requirements. He has been the organizer of Cast in Steel and Casting Dreams to encourage young people to come into our industry.

Janin Eiken
ACCESS e.V., Germany

Janin Eiken (née Tiaden) is a senior research scientist at ACCESS e.V., an independent institute for materials research and process innovation in Aachen, Germany She received her Diplom in Mechanical Engineering from the Technical University of Braunschweig and her Doctor of Engineering degree (summa cum laude) from the Faculty of Georesources and Materials Engineering at RWTH Aachen University. Her doctoral thesis, “A Phase-Field Model for Technical Alloy Solidification”, was honored with the Borchers’ Medal and the Friedrich Wilhelm Award. Over more than three decades of research, she has made substantial contributions to applied microstructure simulation, particularly through advancing the development of the commercial multi-phase-field software MICRESS® and its coupling to CALPHAD databases. She has been actively involved in numerous collaborative research projects and has continuously published her work in peer-reviewed journals and presented at international conferences, including MCWASP. Her current research focuses on applied multi-phase-field approaches for ductile cast irons and secondary aluminum alloys.

Alan Hughes
The Whitechapel Bell Foundry, UK

Liveryman of the Worshipful Company of Founders

Master 28 October 2024 – 27 October 2025

Alan was educated at Christ’s Hospital, where he was a Skinners’ Company Presentee.

On leaving school in 1966, Alan immediately joined the family bell founding business at the Whitechapel Bell Foundry. He worked his way up through the company, working in the foundry, bell frame fabrication shop, blacksmiths shop, with the site working team and in the drawing office, whilst studying Foundry Technology at what is now the University of the South Bank (LSBU). He became a shareholder and was appointed a director in 1972, becoming the 4th generation of the Hughes family to own the Whitechapel Bell Foundry.

Alan joined the Founders Company in 2000. He has served on the Industry Committee and since 2019 has been Honorary Secretary of the Historical Group. Alan is the fourth owner of the Whitechapel Bell Foundry business to serve as Master of the Founders’ Company.

Alan has been happily married to Kathryn for 39 years, and they have worked together at the Whitechapel Bell Foundry for most of that time.

The Worshipful company of Founders

The Worshipful Company of Founders was formed in 1365 as a medieval guild to promote the interests of its members and ensuring high standards of quality and workmanship in articles made in bronze and brass. More than 650 years later the Company continues to support research and education in related disciplines and industries, and support the City of London. The Company has an incredibly wide variety of members and continues to welcome new ones.