Category Archives: Our Fellows Profile

Andrew Zalesky is a Professor in Engineering and Medicine at the University of Melbourne. He completed his PhD in Electrical Engineering at the same institute in 2007. Adopting an engineering mindset to study the brain has enabled Prof Zalesky to innovate novel methods and models to understand the network organisation of the human connectome in health and disease. He established one of the most widely used tools for performing statistical inference on connectomes, co-authored the first textbook on brain network analysis and led development of the Melbourne Subcortex Atlas. A/Prof Zalesky is ranked among the top-1% of researchers worldwide according to citations to his work (2018-2021) and he was recently voted by his peers as one of Australia’s most innovative biomedical engineers.

He leads the Systems Group (www.sysneuro.org) at the University of Melbourne, a multidisciplinary group of engineers, neuroscientists and psychiatrists, who use neuroimaging and computational modelling techniques to study the human brain in health and mental illness. A/Prof Zalesky currently serves as an Associate Editor for Network Neuroscience, Brain Topography and Neuroimage Clinical.

Research

Prof Zalesky and team will use advanced brain imaging and computational modelling methods to map and understand the dysfunctional brain circuits responsible for psychiatric symptoms. He aims to conduct fundamental research to enable a new era of safe, high-tech psychiatric therapies based on electrical and magnetic brain stimulation techniques. This research is expected to improve treatment efficacy, and thus lead to better outcomes, relieve significant distress and improve quality of life for people with mental illness. The Foundation’s support will facilitate the establishment of world-leading capacity in multidisciplinary psychiatry research and provide outstanding research training opportunities for Australia’s next-generation of psychiatry and neuroscience researchers.

Prof Valentina Lorenzetti was awarded a PhD at the University of Melbourne in 2012, and conducted postdoctoral research at Monash University, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (Brazil) and University of Liverpool (UK). She is Lead of the Neuroscience of Addiction and Mental Health Program and Deputy Director of the Healthy Brain and Mind Research Centre, School of Behavioural and Health Sciences, Faculty of Health at the Australian Catholic University.

Prof Lorenzetti’s research focuses on mapping brain, cognitive and mental health outcomes in addiction using multimodal brain imaging tools, global consortia and multidisciplinary approaches; and develops brain-based interventions to mitigate addiction-related harms. She created the first universal measure of cannabis potency – the standard THC unit – which changed the research agenda of the National Institute of Health and other major international health organisations.

Research

Addiction is the leading cause of preventable illnesses and premature death nationwide and globally, yet it is highly stigmatized and understudied. Prof Lorenzetti and her team believe that everyone vulnerable to or impacted by addiction and mental health problems, deserves the opportunity for a better life. Prof Lorenzetti was awarded the Rebecca L. Cooper Medical Research Foundation Al and Val Rosenstrauss Fellowship beginning in 2022 to unlock the origins of addiction and related mental health problems, and to trial interventions to minimise the harms of addiction. To this end, she will lead research that identifies with precision those most vulnerable to experience brain and mental health harms with cannabis via combining multimodal brain imaging, global consortia and multidisciplinary approaches; and she will examine how mindfulness-based therapies and neuromodulation can mitigate addiction related harms.

Dr Selina Parry is a Senior Lecturer within the Department of Physiotherapy at The University of Melbourne. Dr Parry has over 10 years of clinical experience within the area of cardiorespiratory physiotherapy and completed her PhD in 2015 in intensive care rehabilitation and recovery. Dr Parry has spent time abroad primarily working with researchers across the United States and the United Kingdom. Dr Parry is passionate about educating the next generation of physiotherapists within her role within cardiorespiratory physiotherapy tertiary education and improving health outcomes for patients after admission to intensive care through leading clinical focused research.

Research

Most patients admitted to intensive care now survive as a result of advances in medical technology and care. However, survivorship can come at significant cost. Recovery can be limited with patients developing significant new physical, cognitive, and mental health impairments collectively known as Post Intensive Care Syndrome. This can last for years post the initial intensive care admission and affect the ability to return to work and quality of life.

With the support of this fellowship, over the next five years, Dr Parry aims to:
1. Explore who is at highest risk of poor recovery outcomes following an intensive care admission to enable targeting of resources and rehabilitation to patients with greatest need and;

2. Co-design (with patients and families) and explore the benefit of a multi-faceted rehabilitation strategy to support intensive care patients in their recovery with the aim of optimising their return to work and usual activities.

Dr Hannah Vanyai is a researcher at WEHI (Walter and Eliza Hall Research Institute) and specialises in the regulation of chromatin – the combination of DNA and the proteins that package it neatly within cells – by chromatin modifying proteins. She is particularly captivated by how chromatin is regulated during embryonic development, when a baby progresses from a fertilised egg to a complex individual. Dr Vanyai completed her PhD at WEHI in 2014, studying the role of the chromatin modifier KAT6A in heart and face development. She then spent two years at the Perkins’ Research Institute in Perth modelling human mutations affecting brain development and function. Dr Vanyai moved to the UK to undertake post-doctoral training at the Francis Crick Research Institute in London, studying embryonic growth of the skeleton.

In 2020, Dr Vanyai returned to WEHI, where she is using various models of neurodevelopmental disorders of chromatin modifier dysfunction to identify potential therapeutic interventions.

Research

Traditionally, intellectual disability (ID) has been viewed as untreatable – a devastating prognosis for families of the 2-3% of all children who are diagnosed with ID. Recently, this view is shifting, with the increased understanding that there is a potential window for intervention in the first few years of life, whilst the brain continues to undergo important developmental processes.

Around 7.5% of all ID cases are caused by mutations in chromatin modifiers, which pack or unpack chromatin to switch genes on or off as the cell requires. The Al & Val Rosenstrauss Fellowship will support the study of lab models to assess the potential benefit of a range of early dietary and medicinal interventions on disorders of chromatin modifiers. Collaborating closely with clinicians at Melbourne’s Royal Children’s Hospital and neuroscientists at the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute, Dr Vanyai’s work will be informed by consultation with clinicians and patient families.

The impact of this unique research program may result in previously intractable ID becoming treatable. This will lead to significantly improved developmental outcomes and quality of life for children and their families, with the improvement of a patient’s ID from moderate to mild expected to increase their chance of inclusion in  mainstream schooling and workplaces.

Dr Natalie Matosin PhD is a Brain Biologist and Group Leader at the Illawarra Health and Medical Research Institute and Molecular Horizons at the University of Wollongong, with a joint appointment at the Max Planck Institute of Psychiatry in Germany.

Dr Matosin has spent 10 years specialising in neuroscience and the examination of human postmortem brain samples to understand the workings of the human brain at a resolution not possible in the living. She is one of few researchers in the world with this specialty. Matosin was awarded her PhD in Molecular Psychiatry from the University of Wollongong in 2015 and subsequently undertook early postdoctoral training at the University of New South Wales in Sydney.

In 2016, Dr Matosin was recruited to the Max Planck Institute of Psychiatry in Munich for advanced postdoctoral training and was awarded internationally competitive fellowships from the NHMRC (CJ Martin Overseas Biomedical Fellowship), the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation and the International Brain Research Organisation (IBRO). Dr Matosin relocated back to IHMRI and Molecular Horizons in 2018 where she has established the Stress and Mental Illness Lab. Her group focuses on understanding how stress and trauma may trigger severe mental illness at a molecular level.

Dr Matosin’s research has provided major insights into the brain biology of mental illness, influencing industry partners, international researchers and clinicians to drive drug discovery, inform human clinical trials, and identify novel drug targets. This work has been recognised through over 20 national and international awards, including being a 2017 Forbes 30 Under 30 Lister for Science and Healthcare in Europe, a 2017 international TEDx Speaker, a 2019 Australian Tall Poppy (NSW) and the recent recipient of the 2020 Rebecca L Cooper Memorial and Brain Sciences Awards.

Research

Intense forms of early-life stress, such as childhood abuse and neglect, are alarmingly common and one of the most robust, transdiagnostic risk factors for mental illness. Early-life stress causes biological changes in the brain that are distinct from those resulting from adult stressors. These include changes in brain structure and the makeup of brain cells that can last into adulthood, likely setting affected individuals on an accelerated trajectory to psychiatric illness.

With support from the Rebecca L Cooper Medical Research Foundation, Dr Matosin aims to comprehensively determine the molecular mechanisms that re-shape the human brain after exposure to early-life stress. This includes understanding how stress “gets under the skin” and is integrated into the fabric of brain cells, as well as understanding how brain cells may be rewired in those who have had very stressful experiences. To do this, Dr Matosin will draw on her international training in cutting-edge experimental techniques to study the brains of people who lived with severe childhood stress at unprecedented, single-cell resolution.

With this work, Dr Matosin aims to develop reclassification approaches to identify individuals with mental illness who have had significant stress or trauma exposure and reveal the biological targets to enhance their treatment.

Dr Amie Hayley is a Senior Research Fellow at the Centre for Human Psychopharmacology at Swinburne University of Technology. Her work examines the neural, biological and clinical factors which underlie harm associated with psychoactive substance usage, and aims to identify mechanisms by which these changes translate to dangerous human behaviour.

Through her experimental work at the Drugs and Driving Research Unit (DDRU), Dr Hayley has developed a novel conceptual and practical framework to support the use of ocular metrics to index driving impairment when someone is acutely impaired by methamphetamine. Over the next four years, Dr Hayley will define how long-term use of these substances affect driving to optimise the development of technologies designed to detect and monitor driver state in real-time.

Research

Australia has one of the highest rates of methamphetamine use in the world, and the highest global prevalence of methamphetamine addiction. Methamphetamine use continues represent a sizable proportion of total health and disease burden, and its use remains overrepresented in road trauma statistics. Despite national initiatives to reduce the impact of drug-impaired driving (e.g. roadside drug testing), amphetamine is now the most commonly detected drug among drivers who are injured or killed due to road trauma.

Dr Hayley has developed novel methods to assess ocular changes relevant to safety and evaluated their suitability for identifying and monitoring performance deficits associated with methamphetamine misuse. Her research has thus far quantified the scope and impact of dangerous driving practices associated with methamphetamine use, and has identified eye-tracking technology as a novel means to monitor and index driver impairment when someone is acutely impaired by this drug. However, no framework has yet established how driving ability is impacted where patterns of methamphetamine use are chronic, complex and dynamic due to longstanding use and addiction.

With the support of the Al & Val Rosenstrauss Fellowship, Dr Hayley will conduct a two-phase multi-centre collaborative research project to comprehensively examine how chronic methamphetamine use affects skills and performance relevant to road safety, and will examine longer-term changes in these driving-related outcomes as patients with a methamphetamine use disorder move through detoxification and periods of extended abstinence. This work will significantly advance our understanding of how novel ocular-based technologies can detect and monitor driver impairment during different phases of methamphetamine use. Furthermore, it will directly contribute to the co-development of novel Driver State Monitoring Systems (DSMS) to detect methamphetamine-affected drivers in real-time. This will improve the safety of vulnerable drug user groups and will have a wider positive impact on all Australian road users.

Dr Robyn Marsh is a senior researcher at the Menzies School of Health Research with an outstanding track record in microbiome research. Her microbiological expertise extends from traditional microbiological methods through to cutting-edge “multi-OMIC” approaches that incorporate machine learning applications. She has exceptional technical skills and is experienced in developing diagnostics tests (including a provisional patent of a test she developed during her higher degree research).

Dr Marsh’s research vision for the next five years is to lead an independent research program focused on paediatric airway diseases; and within 10 years to become a senior fellow with oversight of a well-established program that is internationally recognised for research and translational excellence.

Research

Persistent bacterial bronchitis is a common condition in children. Left untreated, this condition can progress to bronchiectasis, a severe lung disease that causes permanent lung damage and can reduce life-expectancy. In Australia, 41% of children newly-referred to respiratory specialists have persistent bronchitis and 9% have bronchiectasis. Although most children with persistent bronchitis initially respond to 2-4 weeks of antibiotics, 44% have recurrent episodes and 16% progress to bronchiectasis within 2 years. Breaking the cycle of repeated bronchitis episodes requires treatments that target the bacteria causing the underlying respiratory infection. The current gold-standard test for diagnosing respiratory infections in young children requires general anaesthesia. As this is not always feasible or suitable, children are commonly treated with broad-spectrum antibiotics. In bronchiectasis, antibiotics may be given for up to 2-years to prevent further lung damage. Though essential to care, this treatment risks increasing antibiotic resistance and may impact the child’s gut microbiome.

Two main gaps prevent improved care of children with persistent bronchitis or bronchiectasis: limited understanding of the way these conditions develop, and a lack of tests that can be done outside of a hospital setting. Dr Marsh’s research aims to address these gaps by improving understanding of the processes underlying persistent respiratory infections, and translating this knowledge into new diagnostics. During the Fellowship, she will use a range of OMICs-technologies to elucidate microbial mechanisms involved in bronchitis and bronchiectasis disease processes. This knowledge will be used to identify disease-specific microbial biomarkers suitable for development into new diagnostic tests. Her long-term goal is to develop diagnostic tests that can be used to inform improved clinical care, reduce the need for long-term antibiotic therapies, and are suitable for use in both urban and remote areas.

A/Prof Andy Philp is Head of Biology of Ageing Program and Director of the Centre for Healthy Ageing at the Centenary Institute. As an exercise physiologist A/Prof Philp’s research vision is to harness the effects of exercise into therapies for diseases of ageing. To achieve this, A/Prof’s research is focused on identifying signal transduction pathways that are important in metabolic control of skeletal muscle, using this molecular blueprint to develop exercise, dietary, nutraceutical and pharmaceutical therapies to modulate healthspan.

Research

Ageing is associated with a progressive decline in skeletal muscle mass and strength, a condition known as sarcopenia. Although variable across individuals, it has been estimated that loss of skeletal muscle occurs at a rate of 1-2% per year after the age of 50, with losses in strength occurring more rapidly, such that older muscles become disproportionately weak. Sarcopenia leads to increased frailty, loss of mobility, an increased risk of falls/fractures, a diminished quality of life, and in some cases, premature mortality. 3.7 million people in Australia are currently over 65 years old (one-in-seven), with projections suggesting this number will more than double to approximately 8.7 million by 2046 (one-in-five). It has been estimated that approximately 30% of those aged 75-84 suffer from sarcopenia, therefore, based on these numbers, over 330,000 people in Australia would currently be considered sarcopenic, with this number predicted to exceed 780,000 by 2046. Accordingly, there is a clear and pressing need to develop targeted therapeutic strategies to alleviate the debilitating effects of sarcopenia.

A fundamental cellular process thought to be central for healthy ageing is the maintenance of mitochondrial function (the principal energy producing organelles of the cell). During ageing there appears to be natural decline in mitochondrial function, reflecting reduced skeletal muscle oxidative capacity, with environmental factors such as inactivity and poor nutrition exacerbating the rate of decline. A/Prof Philp will use the support of the Al & Val Rosenstrauss fellowship to study (1) the causal relationship between reduced mitochondrial function and the onset of sarcopenia and (2) to test whether increasing mitochondrial function with nutraceutical and pharmaceutical modulators of mitochondrial energetics, remodelling and degradation can prevent the onset of sarcopenia. To achieve this aim, A/Prof Philp’s fellowship will follow a translational pipeline, with initial research using model systems of accelerated ageing such as the nematode c. elegans, through to pre-clinical studies in elderly human volunteers. The overarching goal of the fellowship is to determine whether mitochondrial targeted therapeutics are viable treatment strategies to combat sarcopenia and by extension promote human healthy ageing.

Prof Graeme Polglase is a Senior Scientist and a Senior Research Fellow at The Ritchie Centre, Monash Institute of Medical Research, Monash University. His research aims to improve the immediate and long‐term respiratory, cardiovascular and neurological outcomes of preterm infants. In particular, Prof Polgase’s research focuses on the events around the time of birth, and how they can influence the safe transition of a preterm fetus to a newborn baby. A/Prof Polglase was awarded the inaugural Rebecca L. Cooper Medical Research Foundation Al and Val Rosenstrauss Fellowship in 2012 to investigate how events prior to birth can predispose the preterm infant to a greater incidence and severity of lung and brain injury.

Research

Preterm birth is defined as birth <37 weeks of gestation, and occurs in approximately 8% of all births within Australia. The incidence of preterm birth has increased 36% in the past 25 years, and is the leading cause of newborn death and disability. Two of the largest problems facing preterm infants are lung and brain injury. Due to the immaturity of the preterm infants lungs at birth, they often require respiratory support, often in the form of mechanical ventilation. It is now known that this requirement of respiratory support can increase lung inflammation and injury leading to long‐term respiratory disease. Our recent studies have further demonstrated that this respiratory support can also lead to brain inflammation and injury. However, the role of the environment within the womb and how this can either amplify or reduce brain injury is not known. In particularly, almost two thirds of preterm infants are exposed to inflammation while they are in the womb; this is known to cause preterm birth and increase the incidence and severity of preterm lung and brain injury including a 4‐fold increased risk of cerebral palsy. The influence of respiratory support on brain injury after inflammation in the womb is not known, and may lead to increased incidence and severity unless we can find better ways to deliver this respiratory support. Further, almost all women at risk of preterm delivery are given steroids to mature the preterm infants lung. This treatment is known to reduce respiratory disease and brain injury, and may protect the brain from injury resultant from respiratory support. The interaction between inflammation in the womb and steroids will also be investigated.

A major component of these studies is the use of new technologies which will significantly enhance our capabilities and understanding of how the preterm transitions at birth. We will combine real‐time measurement of lung inflation and blood flow using state of the art phase‐contrast imaging at the Australian Synchrotron. Brain injury will be assessed using multiple modalities of Magnetic Resonance Imaging, specifically targeting early markers of brain inflammation and injury. Demonstration that brain injury occurs due to the initial respiratory support, and that better techniques can prevent the progression of brain injury, will directly influence change in clinical practice resulting in improved outcomes for preterm babies.

Dr Shelley Gorman is a Senior Research Fellow at the Telethon Kids Institute. Her research aims to better understand the health effects of sun exposure and vitamin D. She is focused on determining how ultraviolet radiation modulates metabolic dysfunction, inflammation, and immunity. Dr Gorman was awarded the Rebecca L. Cooper Medical Research Foundation Al and Val Rosenstrauss Fellowship beginning in 2016 to investigate how safe sun exposure might be harnessed to reduce obesity development.

Research

Sunlight, and in particular ultraviolet radiation, is essential for life, and has shaped the way organisms acquire energy and synthesize essential mediators like vitamin D. Ultraviolet radiation is an important environmental agent, which is plentiful in sun-soaked Australia. While we have evolved under the influence of sunlight, our lifestyles have dramatically changed in recent times, perhaps paradoxically contributing to the high prevalence of many ‘westernised’ disorders. These include obesity and diabetes, diseases that are national health priorities. Dr Gorman’s novel findings, published in the leading endocrinology journal Diabetes, suggest that routine low-level (non-burning) sun exposure may reduce the development of obesity. These studies describe how ongoing exposure to non-burning doses of ultraviolet radiation attenuated the development of obesity and diabetes in mice fed a high fat diet.

The overarching aim of Dr Gorman’s research program is to determine how ongoing exposure to ultraviolet radiation throughout life restricts the development of obesity and type-2 diabetes. More specifically, she will determine how ultraviolet radiation limits the development of obesity and type-2 diabetes through pre-clinical modeling. A further aim will be to determine whether inadequate sun exposure throughout life contributes towards obesity and type-2 diabetes using data from population-based studies, in which serial measurements of sun exposure and body composition have been measured. Finally, Dr Gorman will assess the capacity of sun exposure to be used for weight loss and reducing the risk for type-2 diabetes and/or heart disease through both pre-clinical modeling and clinical studies.

Obesity affects social wellbeing, and decreases quality of life and lifespan. Obesity has a substantial cost on our health system such that even a modest effect could translate into significant savings. Sun exposure is a novel, accessible, equitable, and inexpensive preventive and therapeutic tool that could restrict the development of obesity and risk of type-2 diabetes. Sun exposure has the potential to improve the wellbeing of many overweight/obese Australians; it could be particularly beneficial for people who spend most of their time indoors, such as office workers, the chronically ill and those living in residential care. The results gathered will contribute towards the evidence-base for health policies promoting activity and exercise outdoors, where sun exposure may become a key element in a framework to address lifestyle changes for the prevention and treatment of obesity and associated disorders like type-2 diabetes.