Rate My Professor Karen Steel

Associate Professor Karen Steel holds the position of Associate Professor in the School of Chemical Engineering within the Faculty of Engineering, Architecture and Information Technology at the University of Queensland, a role she has occupied since 2019. She progressed from Lecturer (2009-2014) to Senior Lecturer (2015-2018) at the same institution. Prior to joining UQ, Steel served as a Research Fellow and then Lecturer at the Nottingham Fuel and Energy Centre in the School of Chemical and Environmental Engineering at the University of Nottingham, UK, from 2000 to 2008. Her academic background includes a Bachelor of Engineering (Honours) in Chemical Engineering from the University of Melbourne, completed between 1992 and 1995, followed by a PhD in Engineering from the Department of Chemical Engineering at the same university in 1999. As Director of Higher Degree by Research Students for the School of Chemical Engineering, she oversees postgraduate research training and leads multiple projects advancing energy and resources technologies.

Steel's research specializations center on energy and resources, encompassing coal science, gas recovery from coal seams, and sustainable mineral processing. She develops innovative experimental and analytical capabilities to provide novel insights for Australian industries' global competitiveness. Key contributions include pioneering high-temperature oscillatory shear rheometry to characterize coal microstructure during pyrolysis and carbonisation, identifying viscoelastic thresholds for bubble dynamics, formulating hypotheses on oven wall pressures, and creating mechanistic models for coke strength. Integrating rheometry with X-ray micro-CT, she examines pore structure evolution's role in coke strength and explores biomass pyrolysis, such as sugarcane bagasse, for biocoke production. Other foci involve enhancing coal seam gas recovery via mineral dissolution, cleat etching, and advanced imaging for flow simulation; and novel CO2 sequestration through Mg-carbonate formation from Mg-silicates or tailings, integrated with nickel recovery. Her influence is evident in projects like metallurgical coal carbonisation, gas production prediction, and CO2 mineral processes. Selected key publications include 'CO2-induced pH control reduces cathode scaling and enhances electrochemical acid recovery from nickel laterite waste solution' (2025, Separation and Purification Technology), 'Effect of temperature on coal maceral dissolution and matrix alteration during NaClO stimulation' (2025, International Journal of Coal Geology), 'Biocoke: Carrying capacity of coking coals for sugarcane bagasse char' (2025, Fuel), 'A novel micro-CT technique for characterising structural interfaces in metallurgical coke' (2025, ISIJ International), and 'Microalgae blending for sustainable metallurgical coke production' (2023, Fuel).