MATERIALS SCIENCE AND METALLURGICAL ENGINEERING Brief history The precursor of the Department of Materials Science and Metallurgical Engineering, as it is known today, predated the establishment of the Faculty of Engineering at the University of Pretoria in 1956. Before the Faculty of Engineering came into being, the state-owned corporation, Iscor (Iron and Steel Corporation of South Africa) established the Iron and Steel Science (‘Yster- en Staalkunde’) Chair in the Faculty of Natural Sciences, which was held by Prof WG Leeman. Iscor also provided lecturers from the nearby Iscor plant at the time. With the advent of the Faculty of Engineering, the chair was transferred to the new Faculty and, in 1958 Prof GT van Rooyen was appointed head of the new Department of Metallurgical Engineering. The first group of graduates completed their studies in 1962. Prof Van Rooyen stepped down in 1994 and was succeeded by Profs Rian Dippenaar, Roelf Sandenbergh, Chris Pistorius, Madeleine du Toit and Roelf Mostert (the current head of the Department). In 1987 the old Physics Building was completely renovated and renamed the Mineral Sciences Building. It was equipped to accommodate the Department of Materials Science and Metallurgical Engineering, the Department of Mining Engineering and the Department of Geology, which resulted in close cooperation among all the sectors of the minerals- and metals-related disciplines.
General focus and areas of specialisation The Department is currently the only fully integrated metallurgical engineering department at tertiary level in South Africa and is capable of exposing our future professional metallurgical engineers to the full scope of the minerals/metals discipline, ranging from minerals processing, through pyro- and hydro-extractive metallurgy, to physical metallurgy, and welding and corrosion metallurgy. Metallurgical engineers who graduate from our Department can therefore feel at home in and make a meaningful contribution to any branch of metallurgy in the 38
60 YEARS OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
1959 personeel en finalejaarstudente in Metallurgiese Ingenieurswese. Voor: Mnr MN van Niekerk, prof DB le Roux, prof GT van Rooyen, mnr JP Hoffman, mnr SW Vorster Agter: K Engelbrecht, HJ Smith, FW Badenhorst.