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An ecologist by training – I hold a B.Sc. (Hons) in Marine Ecology from the University of North Carolina, Wilmington and a Ph.D. in Ecological Modelling from Griffith University. I am broadly interested in exploring new ways to (1) understand how natural communities are formed and (2) predict how they will change over time. As an Amplify Fellow at UQ, my current research focuses on developing computational tools and adapting techniques from epidemiology and statistical forecasting to study how organisms and ecosystems respond to environmental change. This work is being applied to investigate natural dynamics for a range of natural systems including host-parasite interactions, wildlife populations and veterinary diseases.

I am an active member of the R community and have written and/or maintain several popular R packages. For example, I’m a lead developer on the MRFcov package for multivariate conditional random fields analyses. I also wrote the mvgam R package for fitting dynamic Generalised Additive Models to analyse and forecast multivariate ecological time series, and I regularly provide training seminars and workshops to help researchers learn techniques in ecological data analysis.

I am currently seeking Honours and PhD candidates with interests and/or skills in veterinary epidemiology, spatial / spatiotemporal modeling and quantitative ecology.

Dr Clark is a Senior Lecturer at the School of Biomedical Sciences where he is Head of the Peptide Chemical Biology Lab. He completed his PhD in 2000 at the UQ Chemistry Department studying marine natural products chemistry and chemical ecology with Prof. Mary Garson. He then shifted his research focus towards peptide chemistry, structural biology and drug design when he was recruited to the lab of Prof. David Craik at the IMB. His current research focus is the development of technologies to stabilise peptide therapeutics and the elucidation of the structure/function activity of bioactive peptides.

Paul Clarke is Director of the Frazer Institute, a leading translational medical research centre studying cancer, autoimmune diseases, infection and immunity, and the genetic basis of disease. Professor Clarke became Director in 2017 and was previously Associate Dean (Research) in Medicine at the University of Dundee in Scotland, Senior Research Fellow at the University of Manchester in England, and Research Fellow at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory in Heidelberg, Germany. Professor Clarke studied Biochemistry at the University of Bristol and undertook research for his PhD at the University of Dundee.

Frazer Institute, formerly UQ Diamantina Institute, is named in honour of its Founding Director, Emeritus Professor Ian Frazer, co-discoverer of the Gardasil HPV cervical cancer vaccine. Frazer Institute is part of The University of Queensland Faculty of Medicine and is a key partner in the Translational Research Institute, a $360 million research facility at the Princess Alexandra Hospital precinct in Woolloongabba. Scientists and clinical researchers at Frazer Institute develop new methods for the prevention, detection and treatment of human diseases.

Brett Collins is an NHMRC Career Development Fellow and head of the Molecular Trafficking Lab at UQ's Institute for Molecular Bioscience. He was a lead investigator in the seminal structural studies of AP2, the protein adaptor molecule central to clathrin-mediated endocytosis, and has since defined the molecular basis for the function of critical proteins regulating membrane trafficking and signalling at the endosome organelle. His team is now focused on understanding how discrete molecular interactions between proteins and lipids control these processes in human cells.

Associate Professor Collins was awarded his PhD in 2001 and has published over 75 papers including in Cell, Nature, Nature Structural and Molecular Biology, Developmental Cell, and The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA, altogether cited more than 3100 times. He is the recipient of 3 prestigious fellowships, including a previous Career Development Award from the National Health and Medical Research Council and a Future Fellowship from the Australian Research Council, and was awarded the University of Queensland Research Excellence Award in 2008. In 2015 he was awarded the Emerging Leader Award of the ANZSCDB and in 2016 the Merck Research Medal from the ASBMB. He is currently the President of the Queensland Protein Group.

David is a Consultant Paediatrician, Metabolic Physician, Clinical Geneticist and clinician researcher. His area of expertise is the diagnosis and management of children with rare diseases. David is involved in multiple ongoing research projects aimed at novel disease discovery, improved diagnostic testing and treatments for children with inherited genetic disorders. He is director of a national clinic for Ataxia Telangiectasia brashat.org.au and has recently been awarded a $2.5 million NHMRC research grant for a phase 2/3 trial for treatment of this disorder.

During my postgraduate studies and postdoctoral fellowship, I gained experience in a wide range of chemical biology techniques as well as in initiating and managing collaborations. Building on a background in chemistry and biochemistry, I developed my skills in peptide chemistry and NMR spectroscopy during my PhD in Australia, synthesizing a variety of disulfide-rich cyclic peptides and elucidating their structures and dynamics by NMR spectroscopy. I have gained further experience in protein chemistry, solid phase peptide synthesis and protein ligations during my postdoctoral fellowship in Vienna, collaborating with Syntab Therapeutics on a project involving synthesis and development of synthetic antibodies for cancer therapy. I have recently taken up a UQ Development Fellowship to establish my independent research area in synthesis and structural biology of posttranslationally modified proteins.

I obtained my PhD from The Australian National University in 2001 and have been at UQ since August 2006

My research is primarily aimed at understanding the origins, diversification and distributions of organisms, especially plants and insects in Australia. I mostly take a comparative approach and use molecular phylogenies to test hypotheses about ecological and evolutionary processes. Recent and ongoing topics include: understanding how interactions among plants and insects affect the evolutionary radiation of each; teasing apart the effects of extinction and speciation to understand how past climate and environmental change has shaped our biota; and investigating the relative roles of continental drift and long distance dispersal in explaining the current distribution patterns of organisms in the southern hemisphere. Specific questions relate, but are not limited, to topics such as:

• how the diversification of the unique Australian flora has driven insect speciation

• whether specific insect-plant interactions are the result of long term co-radiation or more recent adaptive radiations of insects

• the relative roles of vicariance (such as that induced by continental drift) and dispersal in explaining the current distribution patterns of southern hemisphere organisms

• evolutionary patterns of host-use by herbivores

• how past climate change has shaped the current distributions of taxa

• assembly of the flora and fauna of current biomes, especially the arid zone, monsoon tropics and southern temperate biomes

• phylogeography of plants and insects, and what this reveals about contemporary and recent gene flow

• consequences of differential dispersal, such as that between male and female scale insects, different developmental stages, or seed and pollen

Professor Simon Cool is Professor of Bioengineering and Director of the UQ Advanced Cell Therapy Manufacturing Initiative in the School of Chemical Engineering at the University of Queensland.

Professor Cool began his scientific career at the University of Queensland more than 20 years ago. He received his BSc (hons) and PhD degrees from the University of Queensland, where he subsequently held a faculty position in the School of Biomedical Sciences. His areas of studies have included age-related changes in the structure of bone and teeth and the extracellular matrix compartment of skeletal tissue that guide stem cell behaviour and wound repair. Professor Cool was invited to join the Institute of Molecular and Cell Biology (IMCB), A*STAR, Singapore in 2003 as a Principal Investigator. He then joined A*STAR’s Institute of Medical Biology (IMB) in 2008, shortly after its inception, to further his research in regenerative medicine, serving as Senior Principal Investigator of the Glycotherapeutics Group. In October 2020, Professor Cool re-joined the Institute of Molecular and Cell Biology (IMCB) as a Research Director, Glycotherapeutics, where he focused on developing novel glycosaminoglycan biomolecules that enhance wound repair and control adult human mesenchymal stem cell activity.

Professor Cool has 117 patent applications across 26 families with 51 granted in the fields of glycosaminoglycan biochemistry, regenerative medicine and stem cell science. He has more than 150 publications and continues to foster strong strategic collaborations both nationally and internationally with academic and industry groups. He has a strong biomanufacturing and translational focus with experience in taking glycosaminoglycan-based devices through discovery RnD on to pre-clinical and clinical testing. Professor Cool also has an entrepreneurial and licensing background having successfully spun-off some of his technology to a US-based regenerative medicine start-up company, SMC Biotechnology Ltd. Professor Cool holds a Visiting Professor appointment at the Institute of Molecular and Cell Biology (IMCB), A*STAR, Singapore and an Adjunct Professor (Research) appointment in the Orthopaedic Department at the National University of Singapore (NUS). Prior to his move back to UQ, he previously held the position of Treasurer, Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine International Society, Asia Pacific Chapter (TERMIS-AP) and Treasurer, Stem Cell Society Singapore (SCSS). He also held senior leadership positions in several Singapore-based R&D programmes, notably as Director, Allogeneic Stem Cell Manufacturing (ASTEM) and Theme Leader in Advanced Manufacturing for Biological Materials (AMBM). Prof Cool currently serves on the Editorial Board of the journals Biomaterials, Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine, and is Asia-Pacific Regional Editor for Stem Cells and Development.

I am a comparative and environmental physiologist based at the University of Queensland. My research focuses primarily how the environment constrains the physiology of invertebrates, fish, amphibians and reptiles. I have a highly diverse research program that incorporates fundamental, curiosity-driven research and increasingly, a more applied research agenda in the emerging field of conservation physiology. Conservation physiology explores the responses of organisms to anthropogenic threats and attempts to determine the ecophysiological constraints dictated by current conditions and future environmental change. My research interests encompass the general areas of osmo- and ion-regulation, digestive and thermal physiology, environmental drivers of physiological function (specifically immune function and disease susceptibility) and animal performance in anthropogenically modified environments.

Dr Peter Crisp is an expert in crop genomics, epigenomics and molecular genetics. He is a Group Leader and Senior Lecturer in the School of Agriculture and Food Sustainability at The University of Queensland. Peter’s research program is focused on crop functional genomics, epigenetics and biotechnology, and has significantly advanced our understanding of the contribution of epigenetics to heritable phenotypic variation in plants.

His group has invented groundbreaking technologies for harnessing (epi)genetic variation and their discoveries have led to exciting new avenues for decoding genomes and for the rational engineering of gene regulation for trait improvement in plants. Having benefited immensely from brilliant mentors, Peter is passionate about training. He leads a budding group of talented students and researchers and is a Chief Investigator in the ARC Training Centre in Predictive Breeding and the International Research Training Group for Accelerating Crop Genetic Gain. Peter is also an affiliate of the Queensland Alliance for Agriculture and Food Innovation and the ARC Centre of Excellence for Plant Success in Nature and Agriculture. His research group seeks to understand the contribution of epigenetics to heritable phenotypic variation in crop plants, focusing on cereals including barley, sorghum, wheat and maize. This includes the development of methods to harness epigenetic variation for crop improvement; understanding the role of epigenetics in environmental responses and using innovative epigenomic approaches to distill large genomes down to the relatively small fraction of regions that are functionally important for trait variation. Research in the Crisp Lab spans both wet lab and computational biology providing a powerful platform to integrate genetic, genomic and biotechnological approaches.

Peter is a former recipient of an ARC DECRA Fellowship and a UQ Amplify Fellowship and an ASPS Goldacre awardee.

Check out the CrispLab website here

Follow Dr Crisp on Bluesky: @pete-crisp.bsky.social, and Twitter: @pete_crisp

I am a molecular biologist and postdoctoral research fellow in Prof. Alexander Khromykh's laboratory. I specialise in non-coding RNA response to viral infections, virus genomics, RNA structure, and viral neuropathogenesis.

I began my journey with a Bachelor of Science in Molecular Biology, graduating in 2012. I then completed a master’s degree where I conducted research under Prof. Keith Chappell in viral protein structure (2015). I then pursued my PhD (2016-2020) at UQ's School of Biology under Prof. Sassan Asgari, where I studied the role of miRNAs in Aedes aegypti biology and viral infection as well as the use of small RNAs to induce gene expression in insects.

From 2020 to 2023 I worked as a postdoctoral researcher in Prof. Robert Harvey’s laboratory at the University of the Sunshine Coast. I conducted research into the genomics and molecular function of congenital neurodevelopmental disorders where our multi discipline team through the Centre for Research Excellence Neurocognitive Disorder identified and characterised new genes linked to developmental disorders.

Since 2023, I have been a postdoctoral researcher in Prof. Alexander Khromykh's RNA Virology lab. Here, I have contributed to work focusing on the role of flavivirus sfRNA in interferon signalling inhibition, as well as using single-cell sequencing and human brain organoids to study the pathogenesis of encephalitic flaviviruses. I have also been working on mosquito single-cell projects and insect-specific viruses for their role in preventing the transmission of pathogenic flaviviruses with Dr. Andrii Slonchak. In late 2024 as a Chief investigator, my team was awarded an NHMRC ideas grant for $1.4mil over four years to study a new class of small RNAs called tRNA-half, for their role in flavivirus infection and their potential use for therapeutics.

Evolutionary and ecological genomics of marine invertebrate animals.

My lab's research is driven by a fascination with genomes that carry within them endless, brilliant solutions forged by evolution over millions of years in response to a constantly changing ocean. We tap into this to learn how the genomes of coral reef invertebrates and their bacterial symbionts interact with each other, and with the environment, throughout their life cycle. We study these gene-environment interactions in evolutionary and ecological contexts, using genomic, molecular and cellular approaches combined with behavioural ecology in natural populations.

We work often with embryonic and larval life history stages of indirect developers, as these stages are crucial to the maintenance and evolution of marine populations. Our current focus is around larval settlement and metamorphosis in the holobiont of the coral reef demosponge Amphimedon queenslandica. In recent years, our work has extended to functional genomic approaches to identify noval ways to control the coral reef pest, the Crown-of-Thorns starfish.

When not immersed in the molecular or computer lab, we are lucky enough to be immersed in the ocean, often in beautiful places!

Paul Dennis leads an exciting research group that applies cutting-edge technologies to understand the roles of microorganisms and their responses to environmental change.

He is also a passionate educator and public speaker who advocates for the importance of biological diversity and evidence-based environmental awareness. He has talked about his research on ABC Radio and a range of other media outlets.

His teaching covers aspects of ecology, microbiology, plant and soil science, and climatology. He considers these topics to be of fundamental importance for the development of more sustainable societies and takes pride in helping others to obtain the knowledge and skills they need to build a better future.

Paul's research has taken him to Antarctica, the Amazon Rainforest, high mountains and oceans. The approaches used in his lab draw on a wide range of expertise in molecular biology, ecology, statistics, computer science, advanced imaging and soil science. He applies these skills to a wide-range of topics and systems including plant-microbe interactions, Antarctic marine and terrestrial ecology, biogeography, pollution and human health.

I was awarded my PhD in Computational Biophysics from the University of Western Australia (2012) for my work on combining molecular modelling and simulation approaches with fluorescence spectroscopy experiments to study mechanosensitive ion channels.

Following this, I carried out Postdoctoral work at the University of Queensland and Curtin University, funded by Early Career Fellowships from the Swiss National Science Foundation and the Australian National Health and Research Council (NHMRC). In 2019, I joined UTS under a UTS Chancellor's Postdoctoral Research Fellowship and started my independent research group. In 2021, I returned to the University of Queensland as a Senior Lecturer.

Apart from my research, I am a passionate advocate for mental health in academia and

supporting PhD students. My teaching and supervision are guided by encouraging students to become 'critical thinkers'. I practice mindful leadership and aim to integrate kindness and gratitude into how I lead my research team.

Pratap is an IP Strategist and Patent researcher. He has expertise in dealing with Intellectual Property issues in relation to emerging technologies such as Artificial Intelligence (AI), 3D bioprinting and synthetic biology. He is currently a Postdoctoral fellow at TC Bernie School of Law, University of Queensland, Australia. Pratap pursued his PhD from the Centre for Law and Genetics, University of Tasmania, Australia where his research was focused on "Patenting issues related to Bioprinted tissues and Bioinks." In 2018, he was invited by Govt. of Japan to assist the Japanese Patent Office (JPO) in harmonizing Japanese Patent Law in relation to AI. In 2017, he completed his Master of Law (LLM) in Intellectual Property from the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), Geneva and the Queensland University of Technology, Australia. He is the recipient of the prestigious International Fellowship offered by WIPO. He holds a Master's degree in Genomics from the Central University of Kerala, India and a Bachelor’s degree in Biotechnology, Microbiology, and Chemistry from Acharya Nagarjuna University, India. Pratap also holds a Postgraduate Diploma in Patent informatics from the Academy of Scientific and Innovative Research (AcSIR) at the CSIR Unit of Research and Development of Information Products (URDIP), India and worked as a Patent researcher in the same.

Taylor Dick is an Associate Professor in The School of Biomedical Sciences and Director of the Neuromuscular Biomechanics Laboratory within the School of Biomedical Sciences. She leads a highly interdisciplinary research program at the nexus of biomechanics, bio-inspired assistive devices, and neuromuscular physiology. Using a combination of experimental and modelling tools, her research answers fundamental questions about how movement underpins evolution, health, and disease.

Upon completing her PhD in 2016 (Simon Fraser University, Canada), in collaboration with Harvard’s Concord Field Station, she undertook post-doctoral training in biomedical engineering (University of North Carolina, 2016-17) where she combined her expertise in biomechanics and muscle physiology to discover how bio-robotic devices influence locomotor energetics and the neuromechanical mechanisms that enable stability during unexpected perturbations. This has since provided inspiration for the optimization of bio-robotic assistive devices, in response to the behaviour of their physiological targets. In 2017, she was appointed a research and teaching academic at the University of Queensland (UQ) where she has developed a uniquely integrative and multi-disciplinary approach to studying locomotion and neuromuscular function with applications across discovery and translation. Her research program integrates musculoskeletal anatomy, neural control, and biomechanics to understand the diverse movements of humans and animals. By combining high-resolution and innovative experimental paradigms with modelling and simulation techniques, her team, a rich blend of biomechanists, physiologists, mathematicians, engineers, and computer scientists, investigates the complex interactions between biological systems that enable the remarkable diversity in human and animal movement.

Taylor has established herself internationally as an emerging leader in biomechanics research. This reputation is supported by prestigious awards, invited talks and review papers, and media attention. Her research has been funded through competitive grant schemes and industry partnerships, with total research support exceeding $3.6 million. Her contributions to research and mentorship have been recognized with a 2024 Queensland Tall Poppy Award, 2024 International Union of Physiologists Junior Faculty Award; 2024 International Society of Electrophysiology and Kinesiology Kevin P. Granata Award, and the 2021 International Society of Biomechanics Jaquelin Perry Emerging Scientist Award. Taylor has been nominated (2020 and 2021) for the Faculty of Medicine Rising Star of the Year Award. Taylor is an elected Executive Council member of the International Society of Biomechanics (ISB) and the elected Chairperson of the Comparative Neuromuscular Biomechanics Technical group. She is a passionate promotor of STEM for young girls—having co-developed the led a government-funded nationwide program to boost girls’ engagement in STEM, BRInC https://www.canberra.edu.au/about-uc/faculties/health/brinc

She currently advises 12 PhD candidates, 1 Master’s student, and 5 Honours students. She has successfully advised 5 PhD, 2 Master’s and 9 Honours students to completion since commencing her faculty position at UQ in 2017.

For more information about her program of research, visit her lab website: https://biomedical-sciences.uq.edu.au/research/groups/neuromuscular-biomechanics

Plant viruses and horticultural crop improvement

Dr Dietzgen is internationally recognised for his work on plant virus characterisation, detection and engineered resistance. Before joining UQ, Dr Dietzgen was a Science Leader in Agri-Science in the Queensland Department of Employment, Economic Development and Innovation. He previously held research positions at the University of Adelaide, University of California, Cornell University and University of Kentucky. Dr Dietzgen’s research interests are in molecular virus-plant-insect interactions, virus biodiversity and evolution, and disease resistance mechanisms. His focus is on the biology of RNA viruses in the family Rhabdoviridae and the molecular protein interactions of plant-adapted rhabdoviruses and tospoviruses. He has published extensively on plant virus characterisation and genetic variability, RNAi- mediated virus resistance and diagnostic technologies with 20 review articles and book chapters and over 65 peer-reviewed publications.