Dr Muhammad Ahsan Mahboob, head of the Digital Mining Laboratory (DigiMine) at Wits University, was awarded his PhD in engineering from the School of Mining Engineering, Wits University, in a celebratory ceremony held at the Wits Great Hall on July 8. Mahboob’s PhD thesis: “A Data Science Framework for Mineral Resource Exploration and Estimation Using Remote Sensing and Machine Learning”, merges data science, satellite imagery and machine learning with the aim to revolutionise mineral exploration.