ProfessorMike Yongjun Tan

Professor of Applied Electrochemistry and Corrosion Technologies

Professor Mike Yongjun Tan (PhD, FNACE) is Professor of Applied Electrochemistry and Corrosion Technologies. Dr Tan’s principal professional interests are in corrosion science and engineering and their applications for enhancing the reliability and durability of civil and industrial infrastructures, in particular underground oil&gas pipelines, hydrogen fuel systems and offshore infrastructures. Dr Tan has actively engaged with the Australia’s energy pipelines, future fuels and offshore infrastructure industries, and served as a Program Leader for the Energy Pipelines Cooperative Research Centre (EPCRC) in its “Extension of Safe Operating Life of New and Existing Energy Pipelines” research program. He has led more than 30 research projects over the past decade to address critical engineering issues that affect the reliability and durability of underground pipelines and offshore oil & gas infrastructures. These include major research projects for the EPCRC (14 projects), the Future Fuels CRC (FFCRC, 12 projects), National Centre of Excellence in desalination Australia (NCED, 1 project), National Energy Resources Australia through its National Decommissioning Research Initiative (NDRI, 1 project), Australian Research Council (ARC, 2 projects). He has led the establishment of the National Facility for Pipeline Coating Assessment (NFPCA), which has won a CRC innovation award and acquired NATA accreditation. Results from these research projects have included the review and subsequent revision of the Australian Cathodic Protection Standard AS2832.1 criterion for cathodic protection of pipelines subject to stray current; a revision of AS4853 of the test voltage applied to pipeline coating; the development of a real time remote monitoring system of pipeline corrosion rates. Dr Tan has received NACE Fellow honour ‘in recognition of distinguished contributions in the field of corrosion and its prevention’. He is an author of over 250 referred publications including two research books (Heterogeneous Electrode Processes and Localized Corrosion (2013) and Localised corrosion in complex environments (2022), John Wiley & Sons Inc., USA). He is also the Asia Pacific Editor for the Corrosion Engineering, Science and Technology. Dr Tan has developed and taught educational and training courses including ‘Materials Performance and Durability’, ‘Corrosion Engineering’, 'Applied Chemistry', ‘Corrosion Chemistry’ and ‘Flowline Corrosion’ during his various academic appointments.

Research Groups
Postdoctoral fellows / Research Engineer:
* Dr Jianyu Xiong, Research Engineer and Facility Manager, Energy pipeline coating research and assessment projects
* Dr Facundo (Bob) Varela, Research Fellow supported by FFCRC and Deakin University
* Dr Ying Huo, Research Fellow supported by FFCRC and Deakin University
* Dr Majid Laleh, the Alfred Deakin Postdoctoral Research Fellow supported by Deakin University, conducting a research project entitled 'Additive Manufacturing for Superior Corrosion Resistance'

Current and recent PhD students
* Sha Ji, Multifunctional coatings (supported by ARC)
* Sara Falahat, Hydrogen embrittlement of addiditively manufactured metals and alloys (supported by Deakin University and FFCRC)
* Peng Zhang, Hydrogen embrittlement of future fuels / hydrogen pipeline steels (supported by FFCRC)
* Mauricio (Max) Leonel Latino, Understanding cathodic shielding and corrosion under disbonded coatings (support by an EPCRC scholarship)
* Ke Wang, Corrosion sensing and detection technology methods (support by an EPCRC scholarship)
* Majid Laleh, Understanding passivity and its breakdown processes (supported by a Deakin University scholarship)
* Yunze Xu, Erosion corrosion sensor technology, (supported by a Chinese Scholarship Council scholarship)
* Aifang Amy Wei, Protecting concrtet structure corrosion by carbon fibres (supported by a Deakin University industry scholarship)
* Reza Parvizi, Understanding heterogeneous electrode processes (supported by a Deakin University scholarship)
* Fariba Mahdavi, A fundamental electrochemical on organic coating disbondment (support by an EPCRC scholarship)
* Shyama Ranade, The detection and measurement of the initiation and propagation of pipeline coating damage under various environmental and cathodic protection conditions (support by an EPCRC scholarship)

Masters project and Honours students, approximately 10-20/year, for example,
* Moayad Alsulaiman, Corrosion testing of cooling water systems (4th year mechanical engineering student project, with Prof Bruce Hinton)
* Robarte Theyers, Simulating crevice corrosion in seawater desalination environments (4th year engineering student project, with J Xiong)
* Mohamed Al Qubaisi, Underground corrosion and cathodic protection the effect of stray currents (4th year engineering student project, with Y Huo and R Gupta)
* Tong Wang, Rare earth metal compounds as corrosion inhibitors for Al 5xxx (4th year engineering student project, with M. Forsyth and R Gupta) Hussain AlomoratModeling galvanic corrosion of metals (Principal Supervisor: Subrat Das)
* Thomas Hallifax-Ballinger, Modelling pipeline coating flexibility testing (Summer scholarship project, and EPCRC Research Assistant funds)