Very High Temperature Reactors GIF System Steering Committee

Ali Siddiqui leads the Advanced Reactors Directorate at Canadian Nuclear Laboratories (CNL).  He leads both the staff and programs undertaking research crucial to speed development and deployment of Advanced and Small Modular Reactors (SMRs) in Canada.  Ali leads a diverse team executing on CNL’s clean energy vision including serving federal clients, developing new commercial opportunities, and providing support for the SMR deployment project at CNL.  He represents Canada on the International Atopic Energy Agency Gas Cooled Reactor Technical Working Group, the Generation-IV International Forum Experts Group and starting in 2024 October as the Chair of the Very High Temperature Reactor System Steering Committee.  He has served numerous technical and leadership roles within CNL, holds a master’s degree in aerospace engineering and is a professional engineer in Ontario.

Takeshi AOKI is an Assistant Principal Researcher in the HTTR Heat Application Test Preparatory Group of the HTGR Project Management Office at the Japan Atomic Energy Agency (JAEA). Since 2022, he has been involved in the HTTR heat application test for hydrogen production using high-temperature heat supplied from HTTR (High Temperature engineering Test Reactor), a Japanese research reactor of prismatic-type high-temperature gas cooled reactor. He is responsible for the safety design and safety analysis in the test. He has been the Japanese representative in the GIF VHTR SSC since 2023 and was elected Co-Chair of the VHTR SSC in 2025. He received a Doctor of Engineering degree from Institute of Science Tokyo.

Brent Wilhelm is a Nuclear Energy Analyst in the Division of Nuclear Technology and Economics within the Nuclear Energy Agency. Brent also serves the Generation IV International Forum (GIF) as Technical Secretary to the GIF Very High Temperature (VHTR) System Steering Committee, and the Computational Methods, Validation, and Benchmarks (CMVB) and Hydrogen Production (HP) Project Management Boards. Brent also supports the Non-Electric and Cogeneration Applications (NECA) Working Group. 
Prior to this role, Brent worked for the Government of Canada as a Nuclear Science and Technology Advisor with Natural Resources Canada, where he informed analysis on nuclear energy technologies in support of Canada’s strategic policies. He has also worked at Canadian Nuclear Laboratories, Bell Canada, and GreenBug Energy, where he gained practical experience in clean energy technology development and the management of infrastructure implementation projects. 
Brent received both a MSc and BSc in Physics from the University of Guelph where he specialized in nuclear energy and planetary bulk geochemistry. 

Elena Poplavskaia is a Nuclear Scientist in the division of the Nuclear Science and Education and Data Bank at the OECD/NEA. She also provides Technical Secretariat for the Generation IV International Forum (GIF) supporting the VHTR Fuel and Fuel Cycle Project Management Board (PMB), Material PMB and the Advanced Manufacturing and Materials Engineering Working Group. Dr Poplavskaia also supported the SCWR System Steering Committee and the SCWR Project Management Boards on Thermal-hydraulics and Safety, Materials and Chemistry, SCWR provisional Project Management Board on System Integration and Analysis, from 2022 to 2025.

Prior joining the NEA in 2013 she was the head of a Research Centre laboratory, where she led the activities on system analysis of nuclear energy systems including advanced fast reactors and closed fuel cycle technologies, innovative institutional approaches to nuclear energy deployment and long-term aspects of achieving sustainability in the cycle. She was also involved in co-operation with the IAEA INPRO project. She holds a PhD in Engineering Science.