Elevate and Innovate: X-ray Analysis and Automation in Cement Quality Control

Marius Combrinck brings 30 years of experience in industrial automa tion and technology management, with a specialization in automation of laboratories across industries. At Herzog, he is responsible for sales in North and South America, where he brings state-of-the-art techno logy solutions to the cement and other industries. Additionally, he holds an engineering diploma and a business diploma from the University of South Africa.

Dr. Marc Bornefeld brings 20 years of experience in the cement industry, specializing in advanced sample preparation and analysis for cement chemistry. He holds an MSc in Mineralogy from the University of Hei delberg and a PhD in Cement Chemistry from the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology and the University of Heidelberg.

Linda Semenyna has Thirty years of experience in the mining industry specializing in process mineralogy, micro-characterization (electron microprobe, SEM (EDS/ WDS), SIMS), bulk characterization (XRD, XRF), Automated Mineral Ana lyzers (QEMSCAN/MLA/TIMA) and laboratory automation. At Rigaku Linda is responsible for conveying the needs of the mining and cement industries to product development teams to ensure Rigaku provides instrumentation and services to suit each industry now and in the future.

Carmen Kaiser Brugmann is an analytical chemist with over 20 years of experience in XRF analysis, particularly in cement and industrial applications. Working for PPC Cement (in South Af rica) as a chemist and XRF specialist, she provided application support for the XRF instruments company wide. As an application scientist for Rigaku, Carmen is responsible for method development, verification and validation of XRF methods, conducts demonstrations, customer training and hosts workshops and webinars.

Akhilesh Tripathi is the XRD Application Manager at Rigaku Americas, a division of Rigaku Americas Holding, located in The Woodlands, Texas. With 30 years of experience in materials characterization using powder and single crystal X-ray diffraction, Akhilesh has dedicated 20 of those years to his work at Rigaku. His expertise spans a range of X-ray techniques, including Rietveld analysis, small-angle X-ray scattering, thin-film characterization, and various quantitative phase analysis methods. Akhilesh is well-versed in conducting XRD-related training, both onsite and offsite, sharing his extensive knowledge with others in the field. He holds a Ph.D. in Chemistry and Material Science from Stony Brook University and completed postdoctoral research at Texas A&M University. Akhilesh has also contributed to the scientific community with over 28 papers published in peer-reviewed journals on these subjects.