Overview
Background
Professor Pettit leads the Bones and Immunology Research Group at Mater Research Institute-UQ and is Director of Biomedical Research for Mater Research. Professor Pettit has led multidisciplinary research discovering intersecting biological mechanisms across the fields of immunology, rheumatology, cancer biology, haematology and bone biology. Professor Pettit is currently a UQ Amplify recipient associated with an ARC Future Fellowship, 2017-2020 and CIA on an NHMRC Ideas Grant, 2022-25. Major contributions led by Professor Pettit include the paradigm shifting discovery of a novel population of resident macrophages, osteal macrophages (osteomacs), and their role in promoting bone formation and bone regeneration after injury. Her team have published over 17 manuscripts based on this original discovery (with over 1700 citations) including translation of this basic research discovery toward eluciating novel disease mechanism from cancer bone metastasis to osteoporosis. This also led to the novel discovery of bone marrow resident macrophage contributions to supporting blood stem cells niches and the key role that these cells play in protecting this vital niche from cancer therapies. Bone marrow and specifically haematopoietic stem cell damage is one of the most serious and life-threatening side effects of cancer therapies. Here discoveries are cited in over 117 patent documents and she is currently collaborating with a major pharmaceutical partner.
Professor Pettit's leadership and achievements have been recognised through multiple awards including the 2019 UQ Faculty of Medicine Leader of the Year (Academic), Women in Technology 2018 Life Sciences Outstanding Achievement Award and becoming a Fellow of the American Society of Bone and Mineral Research. Professor Pettit has been invited to give numerous presentations at national and international conferences including Seoul Symposium on Bone Health, Asia-Pacific League of Associations for Rheumatology Congress and a prestigious American Society of Bone and Mineral Research Meet-the-Professor session. Professor Pettit is and Associate Editor for the Journal of Bone and Mineral Research, is an past Council member for the Australian and New Zealand Bone and Mineral Society, and chairs or serves on numerous committees including the Association of Australian Medical Research Institutes Gender Equity, Diversity and Inclusion Committee. PhD candidates under Professor Pettit's supervision have all been supported by scholarships (including 2 x NHMRC), received numerous local and national awards (e.g. Dr Alexander, ASMR QLD Premier Postgraduate Award, 2011 and Dr Lena Batoon won the UQ Faculty of Medicine Graduate of the Year Award, 2021), all had high quality first author publications at completion and 2 received UQ Dean’s Commendations.
Availability
- Professor Allison Pettit is:
- Available for supervision
- Media expert
Fields of research
Qualifications
- Bachelor (Honours) of Science (Advanced), Griffith University
- Doctor of Philosophy, The University of Queensland
Research impacts
- Discovery that the transcription factor RelB is a critical molecular mediator of dendritic cell antigen presentation and extended this to show that RelB expressing dendritic cells have critical roles in the initiation and perpetuation of joint inflammation in inflammatory arthritis. These discoveries were used by my principal HDR supervisor (Professor Ranjeny Thomas; https://researchers.uq.edu.au/researcher/396) as the knowledge platform to develop the first vaccine therapy for rheumatoid arthritis.
- Demonstration that RANKL is the essential and rate limiting cytokine required for osteoclast formation and focal bone erosion in inflammatory arthritis. This research output influenced pharmaceutical industry development of the blockbuster drug Denosumab.
- Leadership of the paradigm shifting discovery of a novel population of resident macrophages, osteal macrophages (osteomacs), and their novel role in promoting osteoblastic bone formation and bone regeneration after injury. This has completely changed how the bone and mineral/orthopaedic research field views macrophage contributions to bone health and disease and has influence parallel fields including tissue regeneration and biomaterials.
- Discovery that macrophages regulate haematopoietic stem cell (HSC) niche homeostasis. The landmark paper on which I am co-first author is a Web of Science highly cited paper (top 1% or research outputs) that has been cited by papers spanning 46 research fields. We have since extended this discovery to demonstrate that resident macrophage resilience to lethal radiation is essential for bone marrow recovery and successful HSC engraftment and haematopoietic reconstitution post-HSC transplantation (senior author manuscript in Blood, 2018).
- Exposed that resident tissue macropahges are fragmented during tissue single cell suspension generation, leaving behind encapsulated remnants of themselves that have detectable cell membrane proteins, intracellur proteins and reporter molecules and RNAs. This undermindes the accuracy of burgeoning high parameter technologies focussed on single cell analysis (e.g. flow cytometry, single cell RNAseq, CITESeq, etc) as depending on the tissue disaggregation and analysis strategy, macrophages are under-represented relative to their abundance in tissues and/or macrophage-expressed genes are mistakenly attributed to non-macrophage cells and vice versa
Works
Search Professor Allison Pettit’s works on UQ eSpace
2000
Journal Article
RelB nuclear translocation regulates B cell MHC molecule, CD40 expression, and antigen-presenting cell function
O'Sullivan, Brendan J., MacDonald, Kelli P. A., Pettit, Allison R. and Thomas, Ranjeny (2000). RelB nuclear translocation regulates B cell MHC molecule, CD40 expression, and antigen-presenting cell function. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 97 (21), 11421-11426. doi: 10.1073/pnas.97.21.11421
1999
Journal Article
Dendritic cells and the pathogenesis of rheumatoid arthritis
Thomas, R., MacDonald, K. P. A., Pettit, A. R., Cavanagh, L. L., Padmanabha, J. and Zehntner, S. (1999). Dendritic cells and the pathogenesis of rheumatoid arthritis. Journal of Leukocyte Biology, 66 (2), 286-292. doi: 10.1002/jlb.66.2.286
1999
Journal Article
Resistance of Rheumatoid Synovial Dendritic Cells to the Immunosuppressive Effects of IL-101
MacDonald, Kelli P. A., Pettit, Allison R., Quinn, Christopher, Thomas, Gregory J. and Thomas, Ranjeny (1999). Resistance of Rheumatoid Synovial Dendritic Cells to the Immunosuppressive Effects of IL-101. The Journal of Immunology, 163 (10), 5599-5607.
1999
Journal Article
Dendritic cells: the driving force behind autoimmunity in rheumatoid arthritis?
Pettit, Allison R. and Thomas, Ranjeny (1999). Dendritic cells: the driving force behind autoimmunity in rheumatoid arthritis?. Immunology and Cell Biology, 77 (5), 420-427. doi: 10.1046/j.1440-1711.1999.00855.x
1998
Journal Article
Inhibition of Ku autoantigen binding activity to the E2F motif after ultraviolet B irradiation of melanocytic cells
Pedley, J., Pettit, A. and Parsons, P. G. (1998). Inhibition of Ku autoantigen binding activity to the E2F motif after ultraviolet B irradiation of melanocytic cells. Melanoma Research, 8 (6), 471-481. doi: 10.1097/00008390-199812000-00001
1997
Journal Article
Nuclear localization of RelB is associated with effective antigen-presenting cell function
Pettit, Allison R., Quinn, Christopher, MacDonald, Kellie P. A., Cavanagh, Lois L., Thomas, Greg, Townsend, Wendy, Handel, Malcolm and Thomas, Ranjeny (1997). Nuclear localization of RelB is associated with effective antigen-presenting cell function. Journal of Immunology, 159 (8), 3681-3691. doi: 10.4049/jimmunol.159.8.3681
1997
Conference Publication
Nuclear localisation of relB is associated with potent antigen presenting cell function
Thomas, R., Pettit, A., Quinn, Christopher, MacDonald, K. and Cavanagh, L. (1997). Nuclear localisation of relB is associated with potent antigen presenting cell function. AAAAI/AAI/CIS Joint Meeting, -, 21st – 26th February, 1997. Elseiver BV. doi: 10.1016/S0091-6749(97)81067-6
1997
Conference Publication
Rheumatoid synovial fluid dendritic cells are resistant to the inhibitory effects of IL-10
Thomas, R., Macdonald, K., Moore, K., Pettit, A., Quinn, C., Thomas, G. and OSullivan, B. (1997). Rheumatoid synovial fluid dendritic cells are resistant to the inhibitory effects of IL-10. 61st National Scientific Meeting of the American College of Rheumatology and the 32nd National Scientific Meeting of the Association of Rheumatology Health Professionals, Washington D.C., U.S., 8-12 November 1997. Hoboken, NJ United States: John Wiley & Sons.
1997
Conference Publication
Rheumatoid arthritis synovial tissue and not synovial fluid, DC express high levels of active nuclear RelB
Pettit, A. R., Quinn, C., Cavanagh, L. L., Thomas, G., Townsend, W., Handel, M. and Thomas, R. (1997). Rheumatoid arthritis synovial tissue and not synovial fluid, DC express high levels of active nuclear RelB. -, -, -.
1996
Journal Article
Inhibition of retinoblastoma protein translation by UVB in human melanocytic cells and reduced cell cycle arrest following repeated irradiation
Pedley, J., Ablett, E. M., Pettit, A., Meyer, J., Dunn, I. S., Sturm, R. A. and Parsons, P. G. (1996). Inhibition of retinoblastoma protein translation by UVB in human melanocytic cells and reduced cell cycle arrest following repeated irradiation. Oncogene, 13 (6), 1335-1342.
Funding
Current funding
Supervision
Availability
- Professor Allison Pettit is:
- Available for supervision
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Available projects
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Deconvoluting Tissue Resident Macrophage Biology
Project only open to Australian Domestic Applicants at this time with competitive stipend on offer.
Analysis of single cell preparations from tissues is a mainstay of biological discovery research. Particularly in the current era of costly investment in increasingly high dimensional analysis of single cell samples toward generation of publicly available data sets. The team exposed an unrecognised technical phenomenon that has high potential to substantively compromise single cell data accuracy across a broad range of research fields including immunology and haematology. Specifically, tissue resident macrophages are fragmented during haematopoietic single cell suspension preparation and leave behind encapsulated remnants containing membrane and cytoplasmic molecules attached to other cells they were interacting with in situ. This phenomenon profoundly compromises accurate analysis of the data generated. Using this unique perspective, the project aims to 1) expose how widespread this phenomenon is in a diverse range of tissues across age; 2) develop optimised approaches to eliminate macrophage fragmentation during haematopoietic tissue single cell preparation; and 3) take advantage of this technical phenomenon to achieve a substantive knowledge gain in understanding bone marrow macrophage specialisation.
The outcome of this research is a broad spectrum increase in the fidelity of biology research that utilises this common approach. This will elevate translatability of research outcomes and ultimately public confidence in the Australian biology research sector. It will create opportunity to collaborate with industry toward improved development of relevant reagents and instrument technology and inform development of digital tools to deconvolute this phenomenon when analysing big data sets.
Supervision history
Current supervision
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Doctor Philosophy
Deconvoluting Tissue Resident Macrophage Biology
Principal Advisor
Other advisors: Dr Katharine Irvine, Dr Susan Millard
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Doctor Philosophy
Advanced optical imaging of bone marrow macrophages.
Associate Advisor
Other advisors: Professor Jennifer Stow
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Doctor Philosophy
Characterisation of sulfate deficiency on preterm neonatal bone growth and development.
Associate Advisor
Other advisors: Dr Yvonne Eiby, Dr Susan Millard, Dr Paul Dawson
Completed supervision
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2021
Doctor Philosophy
Osteal macrophages as therapeutic targets for fracture repair
Principal Advisor
Other advisors: Dr Liza Raggatt, Dr Susan Millard
-
2018
Doctor Philosophy
The role of macrophages in facilitating haematopoietic stem cell engraftment and reconstitution
Principal Advisor
Other advisors: Professor Jean-Pierre Levesque, Dr Liza Raggatt
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2010
Doctor Philosophy
Osteal macrophages (osteomacs) are pivotal for intramembranous bone formation in vivo: Osteomacs facilitate osteoblast maintenance in vivo and enhance osteoblast-mediated bone deposition in a murine model of bone healing
Principal Advisor
Other advisors: Professor David Hume, Dr Liza Raggatt
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2023
Doctor Philosophy
Deciphering the Influence of Macrophages on Endothelial Progenitors
Associate Advisor
Other advisors: Dr Simranpreet Kaur, Professor Antje Blumenthal, Professor Kiarash Khosrotehrani
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2020
Doctor Philosophy
Safer conditioning for antigen-encoding bone marrow transfer to induce immune tolerance
Associate Advisor
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2019
Doctor Philosophy
Biomimetic Multilayered Nano-Fibrous Scaffolds for Guided Bone Regeneration
Associate Advisor
Other advisors: Professor Justin Cooper-White
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2016
Doctor Philosophy
Determining the mechanisms underlying multicentric carpotarsal osteolysis and osteogenesis imperfecta type V
Associate Advisor
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2015
Doctor Philosophy
Inflammation-driven bone formation in ankylosing spondylitis: Characterisation of the proteoglycan-induced spondylitis mouse model
Associate Advisor
-
2009
Doctor Philosophy
Role of macrophages, residing on the bone surface, in bone remodelling and repair
Associate Advisor
Other advisors: Professor David Hume, Dr Liza Raggatt
Media
Enquiries
Contact Professor Allison Pettit directly for media enquiries about:
- Bone Marrow Transplantation
- Osteoporosis Fragility Fracture
- Tissue regeneration
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