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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 and vaccinologist whose work focuses on innovative vaccine platforms and advanced delivery technologies. His research spans several pathogens of global health importance, including seasonal and pandemic influenza, flaviviruses, poliovirus, SARS-CoV-2, and emerging viral threats. He works across multiple vaccine modalities, from recombinant proteins and virus-like particles to DNA, mRNA, and self-amplifying RNA platforms.

A major research focus is improving vaccine performance through targeted skin delivery using microarray patches (MAPs) to access immune-rich epidermal and dermal layers. By applying spatial transcriptomics and other tissue-scale profiling tools, we aim to map how MAP vaccines interact with the skin and draining lymph nodes in vivo to inform next-generation vaccine design.

He is also focusing on new RNA technologies, including self-amplifying RNA systems for both vaccine and therapeutic applications. This work integrates virology, RNA engineering, and spatial immunology to better understand and enhance immune responses at the tissue level.

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.

Professor McNaughton is Professor of Nutrition and Dietetics and Discipline Lead for Nutrition and Dietetics in the School of Human Movement and Nutrition Sciences, University of Queensland and Health and Well-Being Centre for Research Innovation, School of Human Movement and Nutrition Sciences, University of Queensland. She is an Accredited Practising Dietitian, Fellow of Dietitians Australia and a Registered Public Health Nutritionist.

She has almost 30 years expertise in nutrition and dietetics and has published over 242 peer-reviewed papers (H-index=60). She completed her PhD at the University of Queensland in 2003, and was subsequently appointed a Research Scientist in the MRC Centre for Human Nutrition Research (Cambridge, UK). She was employed at Deakin University from 2005 -2023. She has previously held nationally competitive fellowships from the ARC, Heart Foundation and NHMRC. She has received funding as a chief investigator on 27 externally funded project grants and tenders from NHMRC, ARC (Discovery, Linkage & LIEF), Heart Foundation, Diabetes Australia Research Trust, World Cancer Research Fund, the World Health Organisation, Food Standards Australia New Zealand and VicHealth. She currently supervises 5 PhD students and has previoulsy supervised 16 PhD students to completion and 9 Honours students & 8 Masters students.

She leads a program of research that focuses on strengthening the evidence-base for public health nutrition strategies and interventions with a focus on epidemiological methods. She has particular interest in translation of evidence into guidelines and nutrition communication messages. Her research covers:

• Developing novel methods for measuring and interpreting population dietary intakes
• Understanding the role of foods, eating patterns and dietary patterns in health and wellbeing;
• Understanding dietary behaviors and their determinants across the life-course
• Understanding the role of food and nutrition literacy in dietary intake
• Translation of dietary patterns research into nutrition interventions, strategies and policy.

She has served on over 20 national and international committees and advisory groups including for the IARC, WHO, Australian Chronic Disease Prevention Alliance, NHMRC, Heart Foundation, Australian Academy of Science National Nutrition Committee and Nutrition Australia. In September 2021, she was appointed Chair of the NHMRC Australian Dietary Guidelines Expert Review Committee.

Ross McVinish has research interests in applied probability, Bayesian statistics and mathematical modelling of complex systems in population biology.

He received his PhD from Queensland University of Technology in 2002.

He is currently an associate editor for the Australian and New Zealand Journal of Statistics.

I am a Professor of Linguistics in the School of Languages and Cultures and the Australian Research Council (ARC) Kathleen Fitzpatrick Laureate Fellow (2025-2030). I am also a Fellow in the Academy for Social Sciences Australia (ASSA), a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Humanities (AAH) and an Australian Fulbright Senior Scholar (2025-2026). I was also the Deputy Director of the UQ node of the ARC Centre of Excellence for the Dynamics of Language which finished in 2022.

Some of my research focuses on language evolution and contact processes across northern Australia where I have worked for the past two decades. In 2021, I won the Eureka Award for Interdisciplinary Scientific Research together with Cassandra Algy, Lindell Bromham and Xia Hua for this work. My new ARC DP Project 'Dingo Lingo' with Myf Turpin and Linda Barwick (U-Syd) is looking at canine words across northern Australia to understand their spread across the continent and their relationship with First Nations Peoples. My interests are also in the relationship between Indigenous Knowledges and Western Science. One place this exploration plays out is in my co-authored book 'Tamarra: A Story of Termites on Gurindji Country' (Hardie Grant, 2023) which won the 2024 Prime Minister's Literary Award for Children's Literature.

I have co-compiled four dictionaries (Gurindji, Bilinarra, Ngarinyman and Mudburra) and two grammars (Bilinarra and Gurindji) and two ethnobiologies (Bilinarra/Gurindji/Malngin and Jingulu/Mudburra). I am also the author of Case-Marking in Contact (Benjamins, 2011), co-author of Understanding Linguistic Fieldwork (Routledge, 2018) and Songs from the Stations (Sydney University Press, 2019) and co-editor of Loss and Renewal: Australian Languages since Colonisation (Mouton, 2016) and Yijarni: True Stories from Gurindji Country (2016, Aboriginal Studies Press). I have also authored over 55 papers on language contact and change in academic volumes and journals. In 2021, I also won the Linguistic Society of America (LSA)'s Kenneth L Hale Award for linguistic fieldwork.

I studied at the University of Queensland between 1995-2001. Between 2001-04, I worked as a community linguist at Diwurruwurru-jaru Aboriginal Corporation facilitating revitalisation programs for Bilinarra and Ngarinyman people. I joined the Aboriginal Child Language project (University of Melbourne) in 2004 as a PhD student. I completed my PhD in 2008 and continued documenting Gurindji, Bilinarra and Gurindji Kriol as a part of the Jaminjungan and Eastern Ngumpin DOBES project, then with my own ELDP grant at the University of Manchester and finally returned to UQ with an ARC APD, DECRA and Future Fellowship. I have also held an ARC DP with Rob Pensalifini which studied contact between Mudburra and Jingulu and Mudburra and Kriol.

My research integrates ruminant nutrition, gut microbiology, and sustainable livestock production, with a strong focus on improving feed efficiency and manipulating the rumen to reduce methane emissions. Passionate about early-life programming, my lab explores how targeted nutritional strategies from birth can optimise lifetime performance and environmental sustainability. The work we conduct spans the full spectrum of product development—from laboratory testing to animal trials—conducted in both controlled environments and large-scale grazing and feedlot systems, often in collaboration with industry partners.

Dr Cristyn Meath is the Hub Director, Sustainable Infrastructure Research Hub at the University of Queensland, a Senior Lecturer at The University of Queensland Business School where she teaches Decision Making & Reporting for Sustainability in the Masters of Business, and Co-Founder of the Infrastructure CoLab.

Cristyn's research investigates how to increase the adoption of sustainable products and practices in industries by improving understanding of the way individual employees, organisations, governments and consumers make decisions related to sustainability. Cristyn has spent a number of years investigating sustainable materials adoption in infrastructure and also co-designing solutions with industry and government to support the transition towards decarbonisation and circular economy. Other sustainability challenges examined in her research include climate change, the energy transition, natural capital decline, circular economy and economic inequality focusing on change enablers such as decision making, corporate reporting, emerging technology, and new collaboration models supporting industry-led sustainability transitions.

Prior to commencing at UQ Business School Cristyn worked with numerous businesses to improve their sustainability, advising business sustainability consultants, and delivering guest lecturers on the topic.

https://aibe.uq.edu.au/profile/839/cristyn-meath

Professor Sarah Medland (OAM, FASSA, FAHMS, PhD) is a Psychiatric and Statistical Geneticist working in Neuroimaging and Mental health genetics. Her work bridges Genetics, Psychology, Neuro-Imaging, Health Economics and applied Statistics with a focus on understanding the genetic and environmental contributions to human behaviour and disease. She chairs the genetics working group of the ENIGMA neuroimaging consortium and is an active member of the Psychiatric Genomics Consortium.

Primary Appointment: Coordinator of the Mental Health Research Program and Group Leader (Psychiatric Genetics) QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute.

ORCID: 0000-0003-1382-380X

ResearcherID: C-7630-2013

Scopus Author ID: 34571085600

Email: sarah.medland@qimrberghofer.edu.au

Qualifications

2006 PhD (Psychology), University of Queensland

Dean's Award for Outstanding Research Higher Degree Thesis

2000 BA Hons (Psychology), University of Queensland, 2000 (Psychology Double Major, English Minor)

Prof David Mee's research interests are in Hypersonic and Supersonic Flow.

After completing his PhD at UQ, he spent five years as a Research Fellow in the turbomachinery research group at Oxford University in the U.K. He returned to UQ as an ARC Queen Elizabeth II Research Fellow in 1991 and joined the academic staff of the Department of Mechanical Engineering in 1993. He served as Head of the Division of Mechanical Engineering from 2007 to 2017, acting Head of the School of Engineering from January to July 2009 and Head of the School of Mechanical and Mining Engineering from July 2009 to February 2017. He retired in 2020 and is currently an Emeritus Professor in the School.

David's main areas of research are focussed in the field of hypersonics aerothermodynamics. He has undertaken much research on rapid response, stress-wave force balances, which are essential technology for categorising the performance of scramjet engines in transient facilities, such as shock tubes. He was a member of the team that conducted the first known wind-tunnel test in which a scramjet vehicle produced net thrust. He has also published on the transient processes in the latter stages of boundary layer transition in hypersonic flows.

Paul Meehan's research interests are in: Smart Machines; Railway Engineering and Technology, Analysis and Control of Nonlinear Instabilities and chaos in rolling processes, spacecraft systems and biological/human body processes, advanced manufacturing modelling and analysis.

Paul Meehan is an expert in modelling, analysis and control in non-linear mechanics applied to engineering systems. He has over 25 years experience in engineering research, development, commercialization and consulting in the areas of non-linear dynamics, vibrations, controls, rolling contact, elastoplastic and wear phenomena, with applications to manufacturing, mining, railway, spacecraft and biomedical systems. He has initiated and led many successful large collaborative R&D projects in this area.

Paul has recently led or is currently leading major projects in novel prediction and control of non-linear phenomena in railway, mining and manufacturing systems, including Decarbonisation, Bearing Degradation Phenomena, Incremental Sheet Forming, Wheel and Brake Squeal, Advanced Duty Detection and Millipede Technology. He has organised three international conferences in various areas of non-linear mechanics and has authored over 140 internationally refereed publications and three international patents in this area. He also teaches several intermediate and advanced level courses in mechanics at the University of Queensland, and consults regularly to high technology industries.

Dr Meers is a Professor in Veterinary Virology in the School of Veterinary Science.

Dr Meers' research has focused on a variety of viruses of veterinary importance including viruses of both domestic and native animal species. Her research interests include viral diseases of livestock in developing countries including Newcastle disease and avian influenza, koala retrovirus, feline immunodeficiency virus and canine parvovirus.

I am a Lecturer (Assistant Professor) in Economics at the University of Queensland and a Research Affiliate at the Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA) since 2016.

I received my Ph.D in Economics from the University of Warwick (UK) in 2016.

My research interests lie in Applied Microeconomics with a particular focus on the areas of Economics of Education and Labor Economics. As a secondary field I am interested in Applied Econometrics.