60 years development and prospect of mining systems engineering

The mining industry is a sector aimed at the safe, efficient, green development, and clean, efficient, low-carbon utilization of mineral resources, serving as a foundational industry for economic and social development. In order to make mining development more economical, consider a more comprehensive range of factors, and optimize the design and development processes, in the late 1950s, operations research and computer technology were introduced into mining engineering, giving rise to a new discipline known as mining systems engineering. In its early stages, mining systems engineering primarily focused on the optimization of mining production processes and the use of computers in mine design, excavation planning, information processing, and application software development, with a predominant emphasis on open-pit mining as the research object. In recent years, research in mining systems engineering has closely integrated with big data, artificial intelligence, network technology, and has achieved fruitful results in areas such as mining information network construction, logistics systems, intelligent mining, equipment management, and safety management. This paper provides a detailed exposition of the origin and development process of mining systems engineering, with a chronological narrative based on international conferences on the application of operations research and computers in mining (APCOM), particularly the fifteen national conferences on mining systems engineering that have taken place. It objectively summarizes the developmental process and evolution of research content in mining systems engineering. Using the CNKI database as the data foundation, current research employs cluster analysis to study the publication volume, research objects, and their changes in mining systems engineering over the past 20 years. The future development of mining systems engineering should focus on the integration of systems science thinking with modern mining technology, establishing scientific systems and their boundaries, such as scientific mining systems, mine lifecycle systems, intelligent mine systems, and other eight major systems. The development of mining systems engineering will increasingly emphasize innovation and application in aspects such as digitization, intelligence, sustainable development, informatization, and automation, while continually expanding its application areas to achieve optimized, efficient, green, and low-carbon mining development.