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Dr Sang Phan work combines research in forest ecology and management with significant experience as a practitioner in project implementation and a community development worker. Dr. Phan’s expertise includes carbon sequestration in terrestrial and coastal ecosystems (such as mangrove forests), sustainable forestry practices, and the valuation of ecosystem services. He translates this expertise into practical outcomes by leading forest restoration programs, designing climate change mitigation projects such as REDD+ and agroforestry carbon initiatives, and improving environmental monitoring techniques. A key aspect of his approach involves working directly with local communities and stakeholders, coordinating development projects, and delivering targeted training to build local capacity for sustainable land management and livelihood enhancement.

I got my BSc degree from the University of Natural Sciences in Vietnam. I spent the next two years working on characterisation of multi-drug resistant Mycobacterium tuberculosis with Dr Maxine Caws at the Oxford University Clinical Research Unit in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. I went to the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute and the University of Cambridge, UK to do my PhD in Prof. John Wain lab where I studied molecular mechanisms affecting the stability of IncHI1 multidrug resistant plasmids in Salmonella Typhi. I then moved to Australia to join the group of Prof. Mark Schembri at the School of Chemistry and Molecular Biosciences, University of Queensland. I am now working on identifying novel virulent factors in uropathogenic E. coli, especially in the newly emerged but globally spread ST131 clone, using high-throughput transposon mutagenesis and next-gen sequencing. I also maintain my interest in plasmid biology and have started projects to study multidrug resistant plasmids carrying blaCTX-M-15 or blaNDM-1 resistant genes.

Professor Phillips has a range of research interests in the historical and contemporary dimensions of sport. He has written on the historical and contemporary aspects of sport and war, sport and gender, sports' coaching, golf, rugby league, rugby union, sport structures as well as the ontological, epistemological and methodological aspects of sport history.

With these interests in mind, Professor Phillips has received external funding from the Australian Research Council, Australian Sports Commission, the Australian Coaching Council, the Australian War Memorial, as well as internal funding from the Universities of Canberra, South Australia and Queensland. He was commissioned by the Women and Sport Unit at the Australian Sports Commission to write An Illusory Image: A Report on the Media Coverage and Portrayal of Women's Sport in Australia 1996, has written a history of coaching in Australia entitled From Sidelines to Centre Field for the Australian Coaching Council, and is currently writing the centennial history of swimming in Australia for the National Sporting Organisation, Australian Swimming. In addition, Professor Phillips has been contracted to edit a book on the ontological, epistemological and methodological dimensions of sport history that draws on the collective experience of twelve of the leading sport historians around the world.

Professor Phillips has been an associate editor and book reviews editor for the Journal of Football Studies and is also on the executive committee of the Australian Society for Sport Historians and is the book reviews editor for the national journal, Sporting Traditions.

Background

Murray Phillips is a senior lecturer in the School of Human Movement Studies. He joined the School in 2000 from the University of South Australia (1998-2000) and also from the University of Canberra (1990-1997). He gained his PhD in the field of Sport History in 1992 from the University of Queensland. Professor Phillips teaches in the socio-cultural dimensions of sport and physical activities.

Stuart is a scientist, educator, and leader who builds and applies methods to measure and understand how our environments are changing at multiple scales (www.eorc.org.au ). He works across collaborative, multi-disciplinary teams and organisations to deliver quality science that draws upon field-work, satellite-image data, and modelling, through: founding directorships of Australia national earth observation coordination body (www.eoa.org.au) and collaborative research infrastructure (www.tern.org.au ) and a world-leading research to operational program that supports government environmental monitoring (www.jrsrp.org.au ); and program leadership of industry-driven research (www.smartsatcrc.com ). Stuart’s work provides solutions to support sustainable development and resource use for all levels of government, various industries, and communities.

Dr. Dung Phung has a background in medicine and public health. He has experienced diverse roles in clinical practices, health policy and management, and research and teaching in epidemiology, research methods, and environmental health.

Dr. Phung’s research now focuses on the adverse health effects of occupational and environmental pollution, climate change, and health interventions. He has developed research expertise and skills in epidemiologic methods, systematic review and meta-analysis, health risk assessment, needs assessment, and policy evaluation. He has recently conducted a series of studies on the health effects of extreme weather events and adaptation interventions to reduce climate-sensitive health risks. He has a special interest in translating complex scientific evidence into health policy and practices.

Dr. Phung has been awarded several research, fellowship, and global partnership grants totaling> $20 million as a chief/associate investigator (approx. $8.5 million as the principal investigator). He has published over 130 peer-reviewed publications in highly reputable journals and has disseminated research findings at national and international scientific conferences. He has supervised 20 PhD students to conduct research projects on a wide range of public health topics worldwide.

I am a globally recognised leader in lived-living experience led research on substance use, particularly image and performance enhancing drugs (IPEDs). Presently, I am a senior research fellow at The University of Queensland, Centre for Health Services Research, funded through an NHMRC Investigator Grant to examine how both individual behaviours and systemic factors, such as stigma and healthcare barriers, shape the risk profiles of people who use IPEDs. My research program has received >$7.5 million in funding and I have authored >170 outputs.

I have strong national and international partnerships. I am the Peer Research Lead and Vice President of the Queensland Injectors Voice for Advocacy and Action (QuIVAA), Research Lead (QLD) for The Loop Australia, QLD Representative for Australian Injecting and Illicit Drug User League (AIVL), and a technical advisory and athlete safety commission member for The Enhanced Games.

My award-winning research program triangulates insights from IPED consumers and health professionals to address critical policy and service gaps. This has led to pioneering initiatives such as the world’s first steroid checking trial and full program, which was awarded Harm Reduction Program of the Year (AIVL, 2024). I also founded Steroid QNECT, Australia’s only peer-led steroid education program, now informing national and international health enhancement strategies related to IPEDs. I have received the AIVL Peer Researcher Recognition Award (2024) and the APSAD Kyp Kypri Early Career Researcher Award 2024 for exceptional performance relative to opportunity.

I am the Section Editor for Human Enhancement Drugs at the Harm Reduction Journal, and sit the Editorial Boards of Performance Enhancement & Health, Drugs: Education, Prevention, and Policy, and Addiction Research & Theory.

Renee Piccolo is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the University of Queensland and Wildlife Observatory of Australia (WildObs), where she focuses on ecological data management and analysis, contributing to large-scale biodiversity monitoring and conservation reporting, in partnership with researchers and government agencies.

Her PhD, completed through Griffith University and CSIRO, developed a decision-support framework to assess the feasibility of habitat restoration under complex biophysical, social, and governance constraints, using mangrove ecosystems as a case study. This interdisciplinary research integrated spatial modelling, conservation science, and applied ecology to support restoration decision-making.

Renee’s work spans species distribution modelling, land tenure analysis, and restoration prioritisation, and is published in Restoration Ecology, Ocean & Coastal Management, and Scientific Reports. She has contributed to Queensland’s State of the Environment Report and collaborates closely with academic institutions and government departments on biodiversity outcomes.

Before entering academia, Renee worked extensively in wildlife handling, ecological consultancy, and community engagement for over a decade. She brings practical field experience, strong analytical skills, and a policy-informed perspective to her work on complex environmental challenges.

Dr Giovanni Pietrogrande is based at the Australian Institute for Bioengineering and Nanotechnology (AIBN), where he is the Synthetic Neuroimmunology Theme Leader.

He leads the development of advanced human brain and spinal cord organoid models to study neuroinflammation, demyelination and neurodegeneration, with a particular focus on how microglia, oligodendrocytes and other neural cells interact to drive diseases such as multiple sclerosis and motor neuron disease, and on using this knowledge to identify and test new therapeutic strategies. His research program is supported by competitive funding from HNMRC, MS Australia, MND Research Australia and FightMND, underscoring the translational impact and clinical relevance of his work.

Together with his team, he works on a broad range of problems, from engineering next-generation immune-based cell therapies and endowing central nervous system organoids with a functional immune system, to modelling their interactions with immune cells to fully reproduce neurodegenerative and neuroinflammatory pathologies. The group also leverages synthetic biology to design new strategies to rebalance neuroinflammation, promote remyelination and repair neural circuits.

Amanda Pigott (BOccThy, PhD) is an occupational therapist with over 25 years’ experience in oedema and lymphoedema management. Amanda has a bachelor’s degree in occupational therapy and a PhD obtained studying the side effects of cancer treatment. Amanda is passionate about improving oedema management. To progress this passion, she works as a specialist clinician, is a key researcher in the field of lymphoedema and delivers education through training and conference presentations.

• As a clinician, Amanda works in the public sector as a clinical specialist at the Princess Alexandra Hospital cancer-related lymphoedema clinic.
• As a researcher, Amanda holds a position as an honorary research fellow at the University of Queensland. She has been involved in research projects securing over $650, 000 in research funding through competitive grants. As a researcher, Amanda ranks in the top 2.5% of published authors worldwide on lymphoedema (May 2024; expertscape.com)
• As an educator, Amanda has been trainign occupational therapists in oedema management since for 15 years. She has provided training to public and private organisations. Her training is regularly delivered via Occupational Therapy Australia. Amanda also delivers lectures and tutorials to undergraduate Occupational Therapy students addressing the occupational therapy role in cancer care, palliative care and management of complex conditions.

Amanda was awarded the Contribution to Lymphology Research award from the Australasian Lymphology Association in recognition of conducting, publishing and presenting lymphoedema related research to promote or support evidence based practice in the prevention, detection, diagnosis and management of lymphoedema. She was awarded the Dr Dorothea Sandars and Irene Lee Churchill Fellowship to study techniques in head and neck lymphoedema assessment and treatment methods.

Amanda is an active member of the Australasian Lymphology Association through her roles on the research committee and conference scientific committees.

Ilje Pikaar received his Bachelor of Science in Environmental Science (2004) and Master of Science in Environmental Technology (2006) from the Wageningen University, the Netherlands. He received his PhD degree in Environmental Engineering in 2012 from The University of Queensland, Australia.

Ilje Pikaar expertise involve the areas of environmental electrochemistry, the global nitrogen cycle, sewer corrosion, next generation sludge management, metal recovery, integrated urban water management and resource recovery with a special focus on nitrogen recovery and production of microbial proteins. Central theme in his international oriented research approach is to conduct high-quality research and extrapolate fundamental knowledge and scientific discoveries to real life applications and development of innovative technologies.

In the past 8 years, Ilje Pikaar has obtained signification funding, including 7 ARC projects as chief investigator. He also played an important role in the development in the CRC Blue Economy, a 10-year AUS$50 million dollar project (https://blueeconomycrc.com.au/). Equally important, his work on integrated urban water management led to a first author publication in the prestigious journal Science. In 2018, his work on the re-engineering the global nitrogen cycle was awarded the prize of best feature article of 2017 in the esteemed journal Environmental Science and Technology. He has also published in other prestigious journals such as Nature Food and The Lancet Planetary Health. Overall, he has published over 40 peer reviewed articles with an average impact factor of his publications of 8.51, which is quite uniquely considering his field of research.

From 2015 to 2019, Ilje Pikaar was the secretary of the International Water Association (IWA) Cluster of Resource Recovery from Water. As the secretary of the cluster for resource recovery from water of the IWA, Ilje Pikaar has been very active in organizing international conferences and workshops and other IWA related activities. Since 2019 he is the co-chair of the cluster. He was the co-chair of the 3rd IWA Resource Recovery from Water Conference in Venice (8-12 September 2019).

Since January 2018, Ilje Pikaar is board member of the International Waste Working Group (IWWG). The IWWG is the leading organisation in the field of solid waste management globally. Since September 2018 joined the editorial board of Waste Management, the leading scientific journal dedicated to solid waste management, as Associate Editor, handling over 100 manuscripts annually. In 2020, he was the handling guest editor of a special edition on 'Resource Recovery from Water' in Water Research. Moreover, in October 2020 he joined the Early Career Editorial Advisory Board of Environmental Science and Technology. Lastly, Dr. Pikaar has signed a book contract with the IWA publishing for the development of a graduate entry masters textbook on Resource Recovery from Water. The expected publication date of this book will be mid 2021. Finally, he is a managing program committee member for the bi-annual Resource Recovery from Water conferences of the International Water Association.

Dr Taylor Pini is a lecturer in veterinary reproduction within the School of Veterinary Science and leads the Molecular Animal Reproductive Biology Lab (MARBL). Taylor's research focuses on understanding fundamental reproductive biology across species, in order to improve the outcomes of assisted reproductive technologies (ARTs) like artificial insemination for livestock and wildlife. Some recent examples of her research work include:

• Exploring sperm formation and function in kangaroos
• How cooling and freezing sperm impacts cellular 'clean up' machinery
• Why frozen ram semen fails to get ewes pregnant
• How the cellular makeup of sperm differs across the kingdom of life

Taylor graduated with a Bachelor of Animal and Veterinary Bioscience (Hons) and a PhD in reproductive biology from The University of Sydney. After her PhD, Taylor undertook postdocs at the Colorado Center for Reproductive Medicine (USA), and with the Gametic Epigenetics Consortium against Obesity (GECKO) at The University of Sydney, before beginning at UQ in 2021. Taylor has worked across many aspects of reproduction (from pregnancy detection to sperm freezing) in a range of species, including mice, humans, sheep, horses, koalas, kangaroos, parrots and echidnas.

Taylor is a co-host and producer of the science communication podcast Repro Radio.

Looking for a research project? Taylor is currently on parental leave, but will be taking on Summer and Winter Scholarship Students (undergraduate), Science Honours Students, Masters and PhD students in 2027.

I graduated from The University of Tasmania, and received my PhD in Developmental Biology from The University of Queensland in 2003. My PhD, performed at the Institute for Molecular Bioscience with Prof. Melissa Little, centred on understanding the cellular and molecular mechanisms underlying embryonic kidney development. My first postdoc was performed with Prof. Christine Holt at The University of Cambridge, UK, where I studied the mechanisms by which axonal growth cones navigate to their targets in the brain, using the frog Xenopus laevis as a model system. In my second postdoctoral position, with Prof. Linda Richards at the Queensland Brain Institute at The University of Queensland, my work focussed on understanding the molecular mechanisms of neural progenitor cell specification in the developing cerebral cortex. In late 2010, I took up a joint position with the Queensland Brain Institute and The School of Biomedical Sciences (SBMS) to continue my research into the mechanisms underlying neural stem cell differentiation. I have held numerous fellowships during my career, including an NHMRC Howard Florey Fellowship, an NHMRC CDF and an ARC Future Fellowship. I currently hold a continuing Teaching and Research position within SBMS, and am currently the Director for Higher Degree Research Training at SBMS.

Professor Pitsis is a globally renowned expert in the strategic design and management of complex and high-risk projects. These projects range from Olympic infrastructure, deep tech quantum computing. Most recently, he is working on AI agent adoption and trust and its role in decision-making under extremely volatile conditions. He is an ideal person to speak on making the impossible possible, and the strategic and managerial constraints and opportunities of engaging and investing in high-risk, but high-reward, projects.

He is the recipient of several awards for his research. Most recently, he and his co-authors were Finalists for the 2025 Responsible Research in Management Award, co-sponsored by the Academy of Management Fellows Group and the Community for Responsible Research in Business and Management (RRBM) at The Academy of Management Annual Conference for their research on ColaLife, a temporary organisation that successfully eradicated childhood mortality due to diarrhoea in Zambia. Other awards have included the Emerald Science Citation of Excellence and the Paper of the Year Award (Human Relations).

He has published in several FT50 and other highly regarded academic and practitioner journals (including Academy of Management Learning and Education, Organization Science, Organization Studies, Long Range Planning, Journal of Management Studies, Human Relations, California Management Review, and Management Learning, amongst others). He is also a co-author of critically acclaimed and best-selling texts in management and innovation.

He has appeared on the radio (ABC) and television (BBC), in addition to podcasts in the UK and the USA. He has also provided strategic advice and leadership development for several major projects and organisations, including the Royal Air Force (Plan Astra), Royal Australian Air Force (Air Force Improvement Program), Reserve Bank of Australia, Reserve Bank of India, Commonwealth Bank of Australia, BorgWarner (Sevcon), TNT, KONNE, just to name a few.

Dr Erin Pitt is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the area of Childhood Allergy and Epidemiology within the Child Health Research Centre (CHRC). Erin possesses a Bachelor of Health Science (Nutrition); a Master of Public Health (Epidemiology and Research Methods); and a PhD, which was conferred in March, 2020. Her doctoral research investigated the influence of local food environment and socio-ecological determinants on early childhood dietary intake using a mixed methods research approach, which had a strong focus on nutritional epidemiology in the context of public health nutrition.

Prior to pursuing an academic career, Erin worked as a Public Health Nutritionist with Queensland Health where she managed, designed, implemented, and evaluated community-based public health nutrition interventions in a range of settings and locations including rural/remote and metropolitan regions. Erin collaborated and engaged with a range of diverse government and non-government organisations and industry bodies to address priority areas including rural and remote food supply issues, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health and nutrition, children’s food literacy and local government nutrition-related policy and planning.

Erin is currently working on a diverse range of projects including determinants of developing cow’s milk allergy in infancy; the role of migration in allergy prevalence; and the potential co-occurrence of allergy with neurodevelopmental conditions. She has a particular interest in the role of maternal and child dietary diversity as well as socio-economic determinants and their association with the development of allergy in children.