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Professor Pankaj Sah is Director of the Queensland Brain Institute (QBI) at The University of Queensland (UQ). He is renowned for his work in understanding the neural circuitry of the amygdala, an area of the brain that plays a central role in learning and memory formation. Dysfunction of the amygdala leads to a host of anxiety-related disorders. His laboratory uses a combination of molecular tools, electrophysiology, anatomical reconstruction, calcium imaging and behavioural studies to examine the electrophysiological signatures of different brain regions and their impact on disease. Recently, his laboratory has been working with patients undergoing electrode implantation for deep brain stimulation, which is used to treat a variety of disorders such as Parkinson's disease, Tourette's syndrome and essential tremor. Professor Sah trained in medicine at The University of New South Wales and, after completing his internship, gained a PhD from the Australian National University. Following postdoctoral work at the University of California, San Francisco, and UQ, he established his own laboratory at the University of Newcastle in 1994. He then joined the John Curtin School of Medical Research at the Australian National University as a group leader in 1997. He was recruited to QBI as a founding member in 2003, and has been Director since July 2015. Professor Sah has published over 110 papers in international peer-reviewed journals. He is also the Editor-in-Chief of the Nature Partner Journal npj Science of Learning, the first journal to bring together the findings of neuroscientists, psychologists, and education researchers to understand how the brain learns.

Leanne Sakzewski is an Associate Professor at the Queensland Cerebral Palsy and Rehabilitation Research Centre, Faculty of Medicine, The University of Queensland. Leanne completed her undergraduate training in the field of occupational therapy at the University of Queensland. Prior to entering research, she practiced as a senior occupational therapist for eighteen years in paediatric rehabilitation and child development. She completed her PhD in 2010 from The University of Queensland in the field of upper limb rehabilitation for children with cerebral palsy, and achieved a Dean's Commendation for outstanding Research Higher Degree.

Research interests

Leanne's research interests are in the conduct of randomised clinical trials in the field of cerebral palsy and childhood onset acquired brain injuries. In particular, she has focused on randomised controlled trials of:

* upper limb training approaches for infants and children with unilateral cerebral palsy;

* intensive models of motor training to improve gross motor and manual abilities for children with bilateral cerebral palsy;

* participation-focused intervention to increase physically active leisure for children with cerebral palsy;

* social skills group-based program for adolescents with brain injuries.

The human nervous system is no longer thought of has hard-wired, and is in fact capable of rapid change throughout life. This plasticity is important for learning, memory and recovery from brain injury. I am interested in using emerging brain stimulation and imaging techniques to "artificially" induce plasticity in the human brain, to ultimately improve the treatment outcomes for various neurological conditions, particularly stroke. These stimulation techniques include transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) and transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS).

I completed a BSc in 1994 and received a First Class Honours in Physiology in 1995 from the University of Adelaide. I then completed a Bachelor of Physiotherapy Degree at the University of South Australia. Returning to research in 2005, I undertook a PhD at the University of Adelaide, which I completed in 2009. My doctoral studies focussed on a new and exciting area of neuroscience – neuroplasticity. At the time of commencing my PhD, it was becoming clear that various non-invasive brain stimulation techniques (such as TMS) were able to temporarily reorganise the circuitry in the human brain in a similar way to what happens when we learn something new or store a memory. I was interested in trying to understand why some people responded to these stimulation paradigms, and others didn’t. What I discovered was that it an important driver of plasticity in humans was when the stimulation was delivered. In effect, the brain seemed to learn better at night time compared to the morning. This has important clinical implications, as it suggests that rehabilitation might be more effective at a certain time of day.

I was awarded a University of Queensland Postdoctoral Fellowship in 2010, and then a NH&MRC Postdoctoral Research Fellowship in 2011 to investigate more intensely how the brains of stroke patients rewire. I am using state-of-the-art stimulation and imaging techniques such as TMS, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and electroencephalography (EEG) to understand how the brain reorganises when it stores information, and how we can boost this process.

I am currently an Associate Professor and Head of Physiotherapy within the School of Health and Rehabilitation Sciences at UQ. I head my own brain stimulation and imaging laboratory, and am conducting experiments in the following areas:

a) investigating the link between brain oscillations, sleep, plasticity and ageing;

b) improving hazard perception with brain sitmulation;

c) identifying factors that improve neuroplasticity induction in health and disease.

I am Professor, NHMRC Investigator Fellow (EL2) and group leader (Exosome Biology Laboratory) at UQ Centre for Clinical Research. I am nationally and internationally (>20 invitations to international meetings in the last 5 years) acknowledged key opinion leader on Extracellular Vesicle (rated 3th worldwide (Top 0.015%) and 1st in Australia in expertise for “Extracellular Vesicles and Exosomes” on Expertscape) and biomarker discovery (140 publications, and >8000 citations in the last 7 year). I have made a major conceptual contribution to EV biology with diagnostic and therapeutic implications. In the last 8 years, my primary research and commercialisation activities have focused on the identification and validation of biomarkers, and development of In Vitro Multivariate Index Assays for clinically relevant complications (including ovarian cancers, and obstetrical syndromes) and their translation into clinical applications. In Academia, I have pursued these objectives through the development and leadership of clinical translation research teams and facilities, both in Australia and overseas. For example, I had a leadership role in established the Centre for Clinical Diagnostics (CCD). Within the UQCCR, I established an exosome research team to evaluate the clinical utility of extracellular vesicles as liquid biopsies, IVDs and therapeutics. Much of our effort in this field of endeavour has involved optimising isolation methods for extracellular vesicles and their analytical analysis - including the use of protein solution array (e.g. Luminex), mass spectrometry profiling (using MS/MS SWATH) and more recently miRNA analysis.

Hemamali Samaratunga MBBS (Hons) LRCP (London) MRCS (UK) FRCPA, FRCPath

• Specialist Anatomical Pathologist, Managing Director, Aquesta Specialised Uropathology
• Full Professor, University of Queensland Faculty of Medicine
• Visiting Medical Officer, Greenslopes Private Hospital

Hemamali graduated with honours from the University of Sri Lanka, Colombo Medical School and completed Pathology specialty training in Queensland. She held a number of consultant posts in both hospital and private practice. In 2008 she established Aquesta Uropathology which now provides diagnostic uropathology services to the majority of urologists in Queensland and Northern New South Wales. In addition to this she maintains a large second opinion consultation practice with requests obtained from throughout Australia and from overseas.

She is active in Genitourinary Pathology research with collaborators in Australia, USA, Canada, Karolinska Institute in Sweden and the Wellington School of Medicine in New Zealand. She held the position of Secretary of the International Society of Urological Pathology from 2015 to 2019.

She was a contributor to the 2004, 2015 and 2022 World Health Organization (WHO) books on Classification of Tumours: Pathology and Genetics of Tumours of the Urinary and Male Reproductive System. She participated in the 2015 revision of the WHO Tumour Classification in Zurich, Switzerland (4th edition) as member, Prostate Tumour Panel. She was a representative of the Expert Groups formulating structured reporting protocols for the Royal College Pathologists of Australasia on kidney, testis and prostate cancer and is currently chairperson of the structured reporting protocols for Genitourinary cancer. She is also currently the Convener for the RCPA Uropathology Quality Assurance Program.

Qualifications

MBBS (HONS) LRCP (London) MRCS (UK) FRCPA FRCPath

Current UQ Appointments

Academic Title-Professor

Non-UQ Appointments

2008 - current: Specialist Anatomical Pathologist & Managing Director, Aquesta Specialized Uropathology

2015 - Current: Visiting Medical Officer, Greenslopes Private Hospital

2003 - 2021: Visiting Medical Officer, Princess Alexandra Hospital

June 2001 - Oct 2008: Specialist Anatomical Pathologist, Sullivan Nicolaides Pathology, Brisbane

1993 - 1997: Specialist Anatomical Pathologist, Royal Brisbane Hospital

1998 - 2001: Senior Anatomical Pathologist, North Brisbane Hospitals Board

Research Interests

• Granular tumour necrosis
• Diagnosis of limited adenocarcinoma on prostate needle biopsy
• Ductal adenocarcinoma of prostate
• Mucinous adenocarcinoma of prostate
• Radical prostatectomy handling and reporting
• Micropapillary urothelial cancer
• Mimics of bladder cancer

Awards and other Esteem Indicators

2017 Admitted to Fellowship of the Royal College of Pathologists, London (FRC Path) for sustained excellence in published works

2022 Awarded the Grawitz Medal of the International Society of Urological Pathology for distinguished service to the discipline of Urological Pathology

2023 Author of the publication Percentage grade 4 tumour predicts outcome for prostate adenocarcinoma in needle biopsies from patients with advanced disease: Ten year data from the TROG 03.04 RADAR Trial. Pathology 54: 49- 54, awarded the prize of

Article of the Year by the Royal College of Pathologists of Australasia.

2024 Distinguished Fellowship Award of the Royal College Pathologists of Australasia

For distinguished service to the discipline of Urological Pathology

Keywords

Pathology, Genitourinary cancer, Prostate, Kidney, Urinary tract, Testis, Penis

Lay detail

• Professor of Cognitive Engineering and Human Factors (Joint appointment: School of Psychology, School of ITEE, School of Clinical Medicine)
• Leader, Cognitive Engineering Research Group (CERG).
• Leader, Cognitive Systems Engineering Group, School of ITEE.
• Responsible for development and operation of the University of Queensland Usability Laboratory (UQUL).
• Director of ARC Key Centre for Human Factors and Applied Cognitive Psychology, 2004-2007.
• Fellow of the Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia (ASSA).
• Fellow of the USA-based Human Factors and Ergonomics Society (HFES).
• Fellow of the International Ergonomics Association (IEA)

Background:

• Adjunct Professor, Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 1997-2006.
• Professor of Computer Science (HCI), Swinburne University of Technology, 1997-2001.
• Assistant and then tenured Associate Professor of Psychology, M&IE, and Aviation, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 1985-1996.

Editorial responsibilities

• Associate Editor, Human Factors in Healthcare, 2021-present
• Regional Editor, Cognition Technology and Work, 2000-present.
• Consulting Editor, Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied, 2005-2011, 2013-present
• Editorial Board, Journal of Cognitive Engineering and Decision Making, 2005-present.
• Editorial Board, Human Factors, 1986-1997, 2005-2013, 2016-present.
• Associate Editor, Human Factors, 2014-2015.
• Associate Editor, Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied: 2012-2013.
• Associate Editor, International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, 2002-2005.

Dr Jodi Saunus is a senior fellow who specialises in translational research on metastatic breast cancer. Based at Brisbane’s Translational Research Institute, she was recruited by Mater Research in 2022 to help facilitate patient-focused research at the interface of biomedical R&D and clinical practice.

Dr Saunus has an honours degree in biochemistry and biomedical science, a PhD in breast cancer molecular genetics, and broad post-doctoral experience in immunology, molecular cell biology, pathology informatics, and early-phase investigator-initiated clinical trials. Her current portfolio focuses finding new ways to improve the clinical management of aggressive breast cancer, with a focus on triple-negative breast cancer, and the prevention and treatment of brain metastases. This work spans across multiple disciplines and capabilities, and broadly involves:

• Molecular profiling of patient-donated blood and tumour tissue samples to identify features that can predict treatment response, or represent previously uncharacterised therapeutic targets.
• Using experimental models of breast cancer metastasis to learn about the molecular mechanisms exploited by cancer cells to survive and grow in brain tissue.
• Developing innovative treatment strategies that work differently to conventional cancer drugs, including alpha-particle endoradiotherapy and in-situ vaccination.

With an outstanding network of collaborators from academia and clinical practice, she has secured more than $6M to fund this work and has a track record of publishing in prominent biomedical research journals (e.g., Cancer Research, Nature, Science Translational Medicine, Nature Communications and The Journal of Pathology).

Peripherally, Jodi is a strong proponent of biospecimen banking, and clinician and consumer engagement in translational research.

Professor Mark Schembri is a prominent microbiologist with experience in combating the global health crisis presented by multi-drug resistant pathogens. Professor Schembri’s expertise on the virulence of bacterial pathogens and his innovative analysis of biofilm formation aims to improve the outcomes of the >400 million individuals that suffer from urinary tract infections each year across the globe.

Through the application of genetic, genomic and functional studies on uropathogenic E. coli, Professor Schembri has identified targets to reduce the virulence of this pathogen, and will pursue the development of life-saving therapeutic and preventative advances with the assistance of NHMRC, MRFF and ARC grants. Professor Schembri has tracked the rapid emergence and global spread of a virulent, drug-resistant E. coli clone and used genome sequencing to understand its evolution and virulence.

Links: Professor Schembri collaborates with national and international research leaders, including in Denmark, where he was a lecturer. Professor Schembri has strong links with other international experts in his field, including at the Pasteur Institute and the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute in Cambridge. His research collaborations also span lead groups at UQ and other top Australian institutes, including Griffith and La Trobe Universities.

Membership, Funding and patents: Since 2014, Professor Schembri has been awarded over $15 million in funding from competitive national research funding bodies. He holds provisional patents for the development of novel therapeutic agents and vaccine antigens. He is a Fellow of the American Academy of Microbiology, and is regularly invited to speak at international conferences in his field.

Awards and Communication: Professor Schembri was the recipient of the Frank Fenner Award (2010) and the ASM BacPath Oration Award (2019) for his outstanding original research contribution to the study of Infectious Disease. He was an Australian Research Council Future Fellow (2011-2015) a National Health and Medical Research Council Senior Research Fellow (2016-2020). Professor Schembri is the author of >240 peer-reviewed research manuscripts. He is President of the Australian Society for Microbiology (2022-2026).

Professor Kate Schroder heads the Inflammasome Laboratory and is Director of the Centre for Inflammation and Disease Research at the Institute for Molecular Bioscience (IMB), University of Queensland, as an NHMRC Leadership Fellow. Kate’s graduate studies defined novel macrophage activation mechanisms and her subsequent postdoctoral research identified surprising inter-species divergence in the inflammatory programs of human versus mouse macrophages. As an NHMRC CJ Martin Fellow in Switzerland, Kate trained with the pioneer of inflammasome biology, Jürg Tschopp. The IMB Inflammasome Laboratory, which Kate heads, investigates the molecular mechanisms governing inflammasome activity and caspase activation, the cellular mediators of inflammasome-dependent inflammation, and mechanisms of inflammasome inhibition by cellular pathways and small molecule inhibitors.

Kate is a co-inventor on patents for small molecule inhibitors of the NLRP3 inflammasome, currently under commercialisation by Inflazome Ltd. Inflazome Ltd was recently acquired by Roche in a landmark deal – one of the largest in Australian and Irish biotech history. The acquisition gives Roche full rights to Inflazome’s portfolio of inflammasome inhibitors. Two of the company’s drug candidates are in clinical trials for the treatment of debilitating conditions such as cardiovascular disease, arthritis and neurodegenerative diseases such as Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s and motor neuron disease.

Kate has authored more than 140 publications, featuring in journals such as Science, Cell, Nature Genetics, Nature Medicine, Nature Chemical Biology, Journal of Experimental Medicine and PNAS USA, and her work has been cited more than 35,000 times. Kate is an Editorial Board Member for international journals including Science Signaling, Clinical and Translational Immunology and Cell Death Disease. She is the recipient of the 2022 Women in Technology Excellence in Science Award, 2020 Nancy Mills Award for Women in Science, 2019 ANZSCDB Emerging Leader Award, 2019 Merck Research Medal, 2014 Milstein Young Investigator Award, 2013 Tall Poppy Award, 2012 Gordon Ada Career Award, 2010 QLD Premier’s Postdoctoral Award, and the 2008 Society for Leukocyte Biology’s Dolph Adams Award.

INFLAMMASOME LABORATORY RESEARCH

During injury or infection, our body’s immune system protects us by launching inflammation. But uncontrolled inflammation drives diseases such as gout, diabetes, neurodegenerative disease and cancer. The Inflammasome Lab is defining the molecular and cellular processes of inflammation. We seek to unravel the secrets of inflammasomes – protein complexes at the heart of inflammation and disease – to allow for new therapies to fight human diseases.

The Inflammasome Laboratory integrates molecular and cell biology approaches with in vivo studies to gain a holistic understanding of inflammasome function during infection, and inflammasome dysfunction in human inflammatory disease. Current research interests include the molecular mechanisms governing inflammasome activity and caspase activation, the cellular mediators of inflammasome-dependent inflammation, and inflammasome suppression by autophagy and small molecule inhibitors.

Dr. Helena Schuch is a senior research fellow at the School of Dentistry, University of Queensland.

She is a dentist and an oral epidemiologist with special interest in social epidemiology. Helena is also interested in methods to estimate causal inference and on applying machine learning techniques to predict oral health outcomes.

She completed her PhD in Oral Epidemiology at the University of Adelaide (2018) and is currently in the Editorial Board of Community Dentistry and Oral Epidemiology.

Qualifications: BDS, MScDent, PhD

Research Interests: Oral health inequalities. Life course epidemiology. Causal inference methods. Machine learning applied to oral health.

Dr Jessica Schults is a Queensland Government Clinical Research Fellow and incoming NHMRC Emerging Leadership Fellow (2026) based at the Herston Infectious Diseases Institute and The University of Queensland. A previous paediatric critical care nurse, Jessica has extensive clinical experience in critical care, with a particular passion for ventilator associated infections. Jessica’s research program aims to reduce the burden of healthcare-associated infections through better hospital surveillance, safer invasive device care, and rapid translation of evidence. She is a Chief Investigator on the IVCare adaptive platform trial, which evaluates strategies to prevent catheter-related bloodstream infections, and leads the NHMRC-funded REBUILD project, which aims to strengthen national infection control systems using a learning health system approach. Jessica has a strong interest in the application of digital technologies, including AI-enabled risk prediction and clinical decision support tools. Jessica has strong, established partnerships with national and international healthcare consumers, organisations, and health services. She holds leadership roles with the Australian and New Zealand Intensive Care Society, is a board member for the ANZ Intensive Care Foundation and is a technical advisor to the Australian Commission on Safety and Quality in Health Care. Jessica is committed to growing the next generation of clinician-researchers, in-particular in the underrepresented field of nursing.

Dr Tom Schultz is a molecular immunologist and early career researcher at the UQ Frazer Institute who studies the molecular and cellular biology of innate immune receptors. His research primarily focuses on molecular mechanisms of Toll-like receptor (TLR) signalling in the context of mycobacterial and Gram-negative bacterial infection of macrophages.

I graduated with a degree in Chemical Engineering and Science in 2000 from The University of Queensland, after which I joined Proteome Systems, an Australian biotechnology company. In 2004 I moved to the ETH Zurich in Switzerland for my doctoral studies. I joined the School of Chemistry & Molecular Biosciences as a University of Queensland Postdoctoral Research Fellow in 2008 and NHMRC Career Development Fellow in 2012. I am now Associate Professor in Biochemistry.

Ian Scott is the Director of Internal Medicine and Clinical Epidemiology at the Princess Alexandra Hospital and a Professor with the Faculty of Medicine. He is a consultant general physician with clinical interests in in health services evaluation and improvement, clinical guidelines, clinical decision-making, evidence-based medicine, low value care, quality use of medicines, non-invasive cardiology, advance care planning, and older patient care. He chaired the Queensland Clinical Networks Executive 2022-2024, is the inaugural chair of the Australian Deprescribing Network (2014-2023), Metro South Clinical AI Working Group, and Queensland Health Sepsis AI Working Group (both ongoing) and is a founding member of the Australian and New Zealand Affiliate of the US Society to Improve Diagnosis in Medicine (ANZA-SIDM). He was also a member of Queensland Health System Quality, Safety and Performance Management Committee (2022-2024) and the Quality and Safety Committee (2015-2020) and the Digital Health Advisory Group of the Royal Australasian College of Physicians (RACP - ongoing). He is a past President of the Internal Medicine Society of Australia and New Zealand (2003-2005) and past member of the MBS Review Taskforce for Cardiac Services (2017-2019). He has led multi-site quality improvement collaboratives in acute cardiac care including both hospitals and Divisions of General Practice. He has been involved at senior level on various high-level committees in establishing policies for Queensland Health and/or RACP on electronic discharge summaries, clinical handover, clinical indicators, evaluation of physician performance, chronic disease management, perioperative medicine, medical assessment and planning units, and patient flow through emergency departments. He has published over 300 peer-reviewed articles, presented to over 170 national and international meetings, and is a recipient of several NHMRC and government research grants.

Senior clinical pharmacist with 3 decades of experience in many facets of the pharmaceutical industry in both Australia and the UK- including work for Queensland Health as clinical pharmacist, clinical educator and team leader, National Prescribing Service academic detailer, Australian Pharmacy Council subject matter expert, Kidney Health Australia clinical advisory committee, CARI guideline working group member, Advanced Pharmacy Australia (AdPha) leadership group chair, and working as a community pharmacist and Home Medicines Review facilitator and provider.

Dr Abbas Shafiee is a tissue engineering & regenerative medicine scientist interested in translational cell-based and tissue engineering strategies to treat human diseases.

Dr Shafiee completed his PhD in Professor Kiarash Khosrotehrani’s laboratory on stem cell biology. His research career during his PhD had key contributions to delineating endothelial niche and vascular stem cells in the human placental tissues, including the seminal discovery of an entirely new stem cell population, coined as ‘Meso-Endothelial Bipotent Progenitor’ and the identification of key driver signatures for endothelial and bipotential progenitor function (Stem Cell Reports 2018; The FASEB Journal 2017; Stem Cells 2016; Stem Cells Translational Medicine 2015).

In 2016, he joined Distinguished Professor Dietmar Hutmacher’s team and conducted multiple projects on cancer and bone tissue engineering. Dr Shafiee has developed innovative tissue engineered models intersecting concepts from stem cell biology, cancer, and tissue engineering to study species-specific cancer bone metastasis at an unprecedented level of detail. The results of his research have been published in: International Journal of Cancer 2018; Cancers 2018; Biomaterials 2018; Bone Research 2019; Biomaterials 2019; Applied Materials Today 2020; Biomaterials 2020; and Advanced Therapeutics 2020. Utilizing the tissue engineering concept, he was able to better understand the mechanisms of human cancer bone metastasis. Additionally, he was successful in obtaining project grants, including a project grants from Cooperative Research Centers (CRC), and developed a biomimetically designed scaffolds and investigated the interactions of multipotent mesenchymal stem/stromal cell and skin progenitors with 3D printed scaffolds. The application of 3D printed constructs in acute wound models decreased wound contracture and led to a significantly improved skin regeneration.

Dr Shafiee joined Metro North Health (MNH, Queensland Health) in 2020 and started a research program to develop, implement, and evaluate the applications of 3D printing, scanning, cell therapies, and biofabrication technologies in skin wound settings, and dermatology research. Using the 3D printing and organoid technologies he could develop new approaches to enhances physiological wound closure with reduced scar tissue formation (Biomaterials 2021, Small 2021, Advanced Healthcare Materials 2021, Advanced Healthcare Materials 2022) and advance the deramtology research (Advanced healthcare materials 2022, and Small 2024). Dr Shafiee is part of a national program, aiming to develop biofabrication technology to treat skin wounds (funded by MRFF, NHMRC). His groundbreaking organoid research resulted in establishing an international Consortium of Organoid Research in Dermatology, leveraging organoid technology to advance the understanding and treatment of genetic skin diseases. Dr Shafiee has supervised over 10 Masters and PhD students. Honours, Masters and PhD projects are available, please feel free to contact him.