The details of this Frontiers Champion project and webinars are found in the project website.

Summary of this webinar:

The abundant increase in waste quantities year by year and the depletion of natural resources worldwide are the major concerns among researchers. Recycling and reusing various types of natural or by-product material waste from industry become highlighted in the recent study to produce artificial aggregates. The growing demand for concrete and the production of sustainable artificial aggregates become crucial in the construction industry.

Sustainable artificial aggregates can be produced either by sintering, auto-clave or cold bonding method. Although auto-clave and cold bonding methods can minimize energy consumption, the selection of the sintering method always leads to high quality and better properties of artificial aggregates produced especially for producing lightweight aggregates. The use of sintering methods to produce artificial aggregates made from pozzolanic material focuses on the use of volcanic ash as raw material activated by geopolymerization process in order to produce artificial lightweight aggregate-based geopolymer is the main objective of this study. The results of the physical and mechanical properties of artificial lightweight aggregate or known as sintered geopolymer volcanic ash artificial lightweight aggregates and their performance in concrete will be presented. The interfacial transition zone of sintered geopolymer volcanic ash artificial lightweight aggregates will be discussed.

Speakers:

Professor Mohd Mustafa Al Bakri Abdullah is a Professor of Materials Engineering, the Director of Research Management Centre and a Research Fellow at the Centre of Excellence Geopolymer & Green Technology at the University of Malaysia Perlis in Malaysia. Professor Abdullah has a BEng in Civil Engineering, MSc and PhD, both in Science and Materials Engineering. His research interests include green materials, geopolymer, advanced materials and construction materials. He has published over 500 technical papers in refereed journals with h-index of 29; many of them are related to the geopolymer production and characterization. He also has a granted patent in the area of geopolymer.

Dr Rafiza Abd Razak is a Senior lecturer at the Faculty of Civil Engineering Technology and also a Researcher at the Centre of Excellence Geopolymer & Green Technology at the University of Malaysia Perlis (UniMAP) in Malaysia. She obtained her MSc in Structural Engineering from University Sains Malaysia and PhD in Materials Engineering from the UniMAP. Her research interests include geopolymer, construction materials, green technology, and artificial lightweight aggregate. In addition, she has published 70 papers including impact journal with h-index of 16; many of them are related to the field of geopolymer. She also has a granted patent in this field.