Simon McKenzie is a Research Fellow at the University of Queensland School of Law. Simon's current research focuses on the legal challenges connected with the defence and security applications of science and technology, with a particular focus on the impact of autonomous systems. His broader research and teaching interests include the law of armed conflict, international criminal law, and domestic criminal law.
Prior to joining the University of Queensland, Simon was a policy officer in the Victorian Department of Justice and Community Safety, working in a team responsible for reforming the criminal justice system to better respond to family violence. He has held teaching roles at the Melbourne Law School and as a researcher at the Supreme Court of Victoria where he completed a major research project on the management of expert evidence in the Kilmore East Bushfire Proceedings, the largest class action in Victoria's history. He has also worked as a researcher at the International Criminal Court assisting the Special Advisor to the Prosecutor on international humanitarian law. He began his career in 2011 at a large commercial law firm in Melbourne.
Simon graduated in 2011 from the University of Tasmania with a combined Arts and Law Degree with First Class Honours in Law and was admitted to practice in Victoria later that year. He received his PhD in international criminal law from the University of Melbourne in 2018.
Prof. Bob McKercher has been a tourism academic since 1990. Prior to that he worked in the Canadian tourism industry in a variety of advocacy and operational roles. He received his PhD from the University of Melbourne in Australia, a Master’s degree from Carleton University in Ottawa, Canada and his undergraduate degree from York University in Toronto, Canada. He has published over 300 scholarly papers and research reports, is the author/co-author of The Business of Nature-based Tourism, Cultural Tourism and Tourism Theories, Concepts and Models. He has also edited a number of other books. Prof McKercher is the Past President of the International Academic for the Study of Tourism; a Fellow of the International Academic for the Study of Tourism; the Council for Australian University Tourism and Hospitality Education and; the International Academy of Culture, Tourism and Hospitality Research.
Faculty of Health, Medicine and Behavioural Sciences
Affiliate of Centre for Research in Social Psychology (CRiSP)
Centre for Research in Social Psychology
Faculty of Health, Medicine and Behavioural Sciences
Availability:
Available for supervision
Media expert
Blake joined the School of Psychology at UQ in 2007 having previously been a lecturer at Queensland University of Technology. Blake won a Faculty Teaching Excellence Award in 2010 and a University of Queensland Teaching Excellence Award in 2016. He led a team that won the AAUT Higher Education Teacher of the Year award in 2019, and received the edX Prize in 2018. He currently teaches a second year elective about psychology and law. His research focuses on jury decision-making including the influence of gender-based stereotypes and the influence of different modes of evidence presentation. He is also interested in group membership and attitude-behaviour relations and how group membership influences thinking about the self. He is a leading instructor of the award-winning course: CRIME101x and the PSYC1030x Introduction to Developmental, Social & Clinical Psychology XSeries Program of four courses on edX.org.
My work focuses on Indigenous sovereignty, digital infrastructure, and education reform, with a particular emphasis on how Māori assert self-determination in systems traditionally shaped by settler-colonial and neoliberal logics. I collaborate closely with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities to reimagine education, data, and governance on Indigenous terms.
I currently lead or co-lead projects that explore:
How Indigenous communities conceive of and enact success in schools
The development of digital infrastructures that uphold Indigenous Knowledge and data sovereignty
Participatory and community-led approaches to prototyping ethical systems design
My research draws on mixed-methods, critical policy analysis, Indigenous research methodologies, and affect theory. I’m especially interested in how Indigenous governance, kinship systems, and epistemologies can reshape public institutions and challenge inherited colonial frameworks. I welcome HDR students committed to Indigenous-led research, critical infrastructure studies, education justice, and digital design for sovereignty.
I am a basic science researcher with training in cell biology, genetics and research translation. My research investigates the female reproductive system by focusing on the contribution of individual cells. I aim to understand the influence of genetic architecture, differentiation and maturation on these individual cells and how this contributes to changes in the microenvironment that can contribute to disease initiation and progression.
After the completion of my PhD in 2008 at the University of Queensland, I undertook post-doctoral studies at the University of Bern, Department of Biomedical Research (DBMR), focusing on endometriosis, ovarian and endometrial cancer. I curated patient samples from clinical research trials to investigate inflammatory and metabolic components of reproductive tissue and disease and began developing patient-derived models of the endometrium. I established a relationship between endometriosis lesions, nerves and pain and how this interaction was mediated by inflammation. I further developed patient-derived in vitro models to understand the interaction between inflammation and hormonal response of endometriotic lesions and how this could be utilized to target current and novel treatments. On returning to Australia in 2016 I joined the Genomics of Reproductive Disorders laboratory to integrate genetic background into patient-derived in vitro models. I established the Endometriosis Research Queensland Study (ERQS) in collaboration with the Royal Brisbane and Women’s Hospital (RBWH) and extended in vitro models into complex multi-cellular assembloids (combinations of organoids and surrounding stromal cells).
Professor Geoffrey McLachlan's research interests are in: data mining, statistical analysis of microarray, gene expression data, finite mixture models and medical statistics.
Professor McLachlan received his PhD from the University of Queensland in 1974 and his DSc from there in 1994. His current research projects in statistics are in the related fields of classification, cluster and discriminant analyses, image analysis, machine learning, neural networks, and pattern recognition, and in the field of statistical inference. The focus in the latter field has been on the theory and applications of finite mixture models and on estimation via the EM algorithm.
A common theme of his research in these fields has been statistical computation, with particular attention being given to the computational aspects of the statistical methodology. This computational theme extends to Professor McLachlan's more recent interests in the field of data mining.
He is also actively involved in research in the field of medical statistics and, more recently, in the statistical analysis of microarray gene expression data.
Dr McLaren graduated in 2009 with a Bachelor of Rural Science (Honours) from the University of New England, Armidale (NSW), Australia. He then completed a doctorate in soil science and cropping systems in 2013 (main supervisor, A/Prof. Chris Guppy) at the University of New England, followed by a three year postdoctoral research fellowship in soil science and grazing systems (main supervisor, A/Prof. Ron Smernik) at the University of Adelaide. From 2015 to 2021, Dr McLaren was a Senior Scientist and Lecturer in the Group of Plant Nutrition under Prof. Emmanuel Frossard, at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) Zurich, Switzerland. In 2021, Dr McLaren returned to Australia and was appointed as a Senior Lecturer in Soil Science at the University of Queensland.
The overall goal of Dr McLaren's work is to provide new insight on the biogeochemistry of nutrients that will lead to improved outcomes for agricultural and environmental contexts. In particular, he is interested in identifying the diversity of inorganic and organic forms of nutrients, and understanding the processes governing their flux in soil-plant systems. An important part of Dr McLaren's work has been the characterisation of organic matter, and understanding the processes governing the accumulation and depletion of nutrients within soil organic matter. In addition, Dr McLaren has gained much experience on understanding the fate of fertiliser in agroecosystems, and assessing different agronomic strategies to improve plant growth and fertiliser use efficiency, and decrease nutrient transfer to aquatic/marine ecosystems.
Dr McLaren's work has primarily focused on phosphorus, but also included sulfur, nitrogen, and carbon. It has involved a wide variety of analytical approaches, including radiotracers (P-33, S-35), stable isotopes (N-15), spectroscopy (NMR, PXRF, XANES), chromatography (size-exclusion), and 'wet' chemistry (e.g. sequential chemical fractionation and hypobromite oxidation). Research has involved laboratory, glasshouse, and field based experiments, a diversity of soil types, and various ecosystem contexts (e.g. cropping, pasture, and forests). Lastly, Dr McLaren has often worked in colloboration with a variety of stakeholders (e.g. primary producers, agronomists, and industry), and formed international colloborations with applied and fundamental scientists.
My research is informed by sociocultural theories that conceive learning as simultaneously intellectual, relational, emotional, and ideological. This understanding has been shaped by my own journey from secondary teacher to teacher educator, and an appreciation for teaching and learning as complex, human endeavours rather than simple exchanges of knowledge.
I investigate how people learn and form a sense of self across diverse educational settings, from secondary classrooms to universities, including in digital environments. Much of my work focuses on how preservice teachers navigate the process of becoming professionals in a climate of policy reform and public scrutiny.
Drawing on theorists including Vygotsky and Bakhtin, my research illuminates the experience of being both a teacher and a student as complex, relational, and deeply human.
Faculty of Health, Medicine and Behavioural Sciences
Availability:
Not available for supervision
Meaghan Enright is a Senior Research Officer at Queensland Centre for Mental Health Research (QCMHR), and an Adjunct Fellow and PhD student at School of Public Health at The University of Queensland (UQ). Ms Enright graduated with a Master of Public Health from UQ in 2017, focussing on global health. She then begun work at QCMHR working on a project quantifying the coverage of the prevalence of child and adolescent mental disorders globally, and later, the National Adolescent Mental Health Surveys (NAMHS) project, which involved planning nationally representative adolescent mental health surveys in three low- and middle-income countries (Kenya, Indonesia, and Vietnam). In 2021 Ms Enright joined the Mental Health Evaluation Stream at QCMHR, whose most recent work involved undertaking a mixed methods evaluation of Queensland’s Mental Health Community Support Services (MH CSS) programs. She is currently leading a mixed methods evaluation of Queensland Health's Crisis Support Spaces.
Career counselling: theory and processes; Career development theory; Career programs; Qualitative career assessment; Supervision
Dr McMahon teaches in the areas of career development theory, career guidance and counselling, and supervision. She is particularly interested in the career development of children and adolescents and how young people may be supported by career programs. In the area of career counselling, she is interested in the application of constructivist approaches especially the use of qualitative career assessment. Within the area of supervision, she is interested in assisting guidance officers and school counsellors develop their supervision practices. Her recent focus within this area is on the use of technology to support rural and remote personnel.
My research has focused on molecular studies of pathogens, disease syndromes and health of Australian wildlife and domestic species. Particular research interests include the study of emerging and novel viral infections and syndromes of Australian bat species, being awarded the School of Veterinary Science, Award for Outstanding Contribution to Research in 2023. I am passionate about my undergraduate teaching in the discipline of animal genetics and genomics and my supervision and mentorship of Higher Degree Research students, being awarded the School of Veterinary Science, Helen Keates Developing Teacher Award, and Higher Degree Research Supervision Excellence Award in 2022. I mentor my students in developing their molecular biology skills in a diverse range of project areas, from molecular detection and characterisation of pathogens with zoonotic potential in wildlife and companion animals, characterisation of novel viruses of wildlife with potential wildlife health and conservation impacts and gene expression analyses in disease of companion animals.
Dr Chris McMillan is a virologist who researches novel vaccine designs and delivery for viruses, including Polio, seasonal influenza, flaviviruses such as Dengue virus, as well as novel and emerging viruses such as SARS-CoV-2 and highly-pathogenic avian influenza.
His work uses a range of vaccine modalities, including recombinant proteins, virus-like particles, and more recently nucleic acid vaccines (DNA and mRNA).
To maximise vaccine efficacy, his research explores delivery of these vaccines using a high-density microarray patch delivery platform, which results in targeted vaccine delivery to the immune-rich layers of the skin. Recent work involves delivery of nucleic acid vaccines against SARS-CoV-2 and Influenza via the microarray patch system to create a potent, agile vaccine platform system to aid in Australia’s preparedness for future pandemics.
He was awarded an Advance Queensland Industry Research Fellowship in 2021.
Karen is a Professor of Development Geography in the School of the Environment, deeply committed to understanding how people experience and respond to the interconnected challenges of poverty, disaster risk, and climate change. Over the past 20 years, she has led applied research on resilient livelihoods, non-economic loss and damage, community-based adaptation, human mobility, and gender—working closely with governments and NGOs across the Asia-Pacific region. Her research has supported farmers in Aceh rebuilding after the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami; assisted newly settled migrants in Dhaka displaced by flooding and erosion; collaborated with Elders in the Torres Strait to record traditional environmental knowledge; and documented everyday climate impacts and adaptation stories in rural communities throughout the Pacific Islands.
Karen has advised multiple governments and international organisations on adaptation, loss and damage, and human mobility. She currently serves on the Expert Group on Non-Economic Losses for the Executive Committee of the Warsaw International Mechanism for Loss and Damage under the UN Climate Change Secretariat. Her recent contributions include a world-first conceptualisation of loss and damage in the Pacific Islands (as part of an ARC Future Fellowship); research on climate-related human rights violations (as part of work for the Vanuatu Government); identification of optimisation points for adaptation outcomes (as part of an ARC Linkage); and strategies to support women in disaster recovery (in collaboration with UN Women).
She has led or co-led 29 research and capacity-building grants totalling over $7.6 million, funded by the ARC, Australian Government, DFAT, National Geographic, OECD, Scope Global, UNDP, and others. Karen has published more than 125 academic papers and book chapters, alongside over 85 reports, commentaries, and policy briefs. She has supervised 14 PhD students to completion (9 as Principal Advisor), many of whom now hold influential roles in academia, government, the UN, and consultancy. She currently supervises 5 PhD students and teaches core courses in environmental management.
Karen proudly hails from Quirindi, Kamilaroi Country, on the Liverpool Plains in NSW. Her upbringing in a small, close-knit rural town sparked a lifelong interest in social, development, and environmental issues affecting rural communities.
