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Dr Abbey Diaz is a Faculty of Medicine Research Fellow and epidemiologist in the FNCWR team. Her program of work is broadly concerned with the quality and equity of cancer care pathways, particularly for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people and for people with, or at risk of, other chronic disease.

Recently, Abbey was part of an investigator team (CID; 2021-2024) awarded a $1 million National Heart Foundation Strategic Grant in Cardio-oncology. Through its work, the team aims to:

• Better understand the risk of adverse cardiovascular events in Australians diagnosed with cancer
• Identify potential high-risk groups and health service gaps
• Understand how cancer treatment decision-making by patients and their health professionals are influenced by their cardiovascular risk.
• Co-design and assess educational resources for patients and health professionals to improve care and outcomes for cancer patients at risk of adverse cardiovascular outcomes.

Abbey is also an investigator on an ARC-funded grant to develop a measure supportive care needs of carers of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people with cancer (CIJ), a World Cancer Research Fund (WCRF) funded grant to pilot an intervention to support cancer patients to reduce exposure to behavioural risk factors (CID), and an MRFF grant to co-design and feasibility test a phase III exercise trial for women with metastatic breast cancer (AI). She led the Queensland Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Better Cardiac Care Linkage Study, commissioned by the Queensland Health department, and was an investigator on a Cancer Australia and Department of Health tender to better understand how information on Indigenous status is collected, recorded, reported at all stages of the National Cervical Screening Program.

Abbey's PhD thesis investigated whether the higher comorbidity among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people with cancer was associated with lower cancer survival and supportive care needs. Her thesis was undertaken and completed while she was part of the National Indigenous Cervical Screening Project, with her PhD (Charles Darwin University/Menzies School of Health research) awarded in 2018.

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

Melissa Dickson joined UQ in July 2023 as a Senior Lecturer in English Literature in the School of Communication and the Arts. Prior to this, Melissa was a Senior Lecturer in Victorian Literature at the University of Birmingham in the UK. From 2014 to 2018, Melissa was a Postdoctoral Researcher on ‘The Diseases of Modern Life: Nineteenth-Century Perspective’, an ERC funded project based at St Anne’s College, Oxford, She has a PhD in English from King's College, London, and an MPhil, BA, and University Medal from the University of Queensland.

Melissa’s research focuses on the relationships between Victorian literature, science, medicine, and material culture, and she has published widely in this area. She is the author of Cultural Encounters with the Arabian Nights in Nineteenth-Century Britain (Edinburgh University Press, 2019), co-author of Anxious Times: Medicine and Modernity in Nineteenth-Century Britain, Pittsburgh University Press, 2019) and, co-editor of Progress and Pathology: Medicine and Culture in the Nineteenth Century (Manchester University Press, 2020). Her current monograph project is a study of the senses and in particular of new ways of listening and thinking about sound in the nineteenth century.

Melissa is currently Co-Investigator of a three-year project funded by the Collaboration of Humanities and Social Sciences in Europe, entitled Media and Epidemics: Technologies of Science Communication and Public Health, which seeks to document, from historical and contemporary as well as trans-disciplinary and trans-regional perspectives, the role of media and technologies of communication in the making and management of epidemic outbreaks.

Melissa is an experienced Masters and PhD supervisor and overseen projects on a range of topics, including child loss in Victorian supernatural fiction, Thomas Hardy and music, animals and the environment in the works of the Brontës, and the condition of women in the fiction of Virginia Woolf, Dorothy Richardson, and May Sinclair. She is available to supervise topics projects on Nineteenth-Century Literature, Literature and Science, Literature and Medicine, Medical Humanities, Sound Studies, and Narrative and Consciousness.

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.

Dr Jade Dignam is a Research Fellow and Certified Practicing Speech Pathologist with the Queensland Aphasia Research Centre, with 17 years’ experience in aphasia rehabilitation. Jade conducts research into post-stroke aphasia and has expertise in the development and evaluation of aphasia interventions, treatment dose, and determining predictors of treatment response. Jade's research aims to improve clinical outcomes for people with aphasia by increasing access to evidence-based, intensive comprehensive aphasia therapy.

Sandra Diminic is a Principal Research Fellow at Queensland Centre for Mental Health Research (QCMHR) and leads the Mental Health Services Research stream. She has qualifications in psychology and public health and her PhD focused on understanding the service needs of carers and families of people with mental illness. Before joining QCMHR Sandra worked on the Australian Schizophrenia Research Bank and interned in Mental Health Policy and Service Development at the World Health Organization; she has also been a visiting scholar at the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, Toronto.

Sandra's research aims to reduce the population burden of mental illness through understanding demand for and utilisation of mental health services, identifying and evaluating evidence-based mental health service models, and applying these findings to improve mental health systems and services. This research program involves close collaboration with health system partners such as national and state governments, Primary Health Networks, and community organisations to provide evidence and advice to support integrated regional and national mental health service planning. Current major projects include development and application of the National Mental Health Service Planning Framework (NMHSPF) and Australian Suicide Prevention Planning Model (AuSPPM), needs-based planning tools which model population needs and required care to produce resource targets for optimal mental health and suicide prevention service delivery in Australia. Sandra also leads projects drawing on population surveys and health service administrative data to understand current mental health service delivery and identify service gaps for specific regions and populations.

Professor in Clinical Psychology at UQ and affiliate Professor at Nottingham Trent University (UK). Her research focuses on social (non-medical) interventions for mental health such as music, arts and nature based programs.

• Course Convenor:

PSYC7291 Cognitive Behaviour Therapies for Adults

PSYC3102 Psychopathology

• Journals:

Associate Editor, Psychology of Music

• Professional Roles:

Cuture and the Arts on Prescription lead, Australian Social Prescribing Institute for Research and Education (ASPIRE)

Member, Arts Health Network QLD (AHNQ) committee.

I am working as part of an academic team on a project aimed at completing a Phase 1 Clinical Trial using pluripotent stem cell derived cardiomyocytes for the treatment of “no-option” end stage heart failure. My primary role in the team is the development of a scalable bioreactor based process for the produciton of pluripotent stem cell derived cardiomyocytes. This process has been developed to meet GMP and local regulatory requirements. Ancilliary to this, I have been wokring on the development and validation of safety assays in line with ICH guidelines for the clinical trial.

Alana is an experienced physiotherapist, researcher and lecturer at The University of Queensland. She has a strong clinical background in private practice physiotherapy, with a particular interest in the physiotherapy management of temporomandibular disorders. Alana is a guest member of the Australian and New Zealand Academy of Orofacial Pain, and is an active member of the Neck and Head Research Unit (NAHRU), Professional Education Research Engagement Theme and Knowledge Translation Research Engagement Theme at The University of Queensland. Alana's PhD explored disability associated with persistent intra-articular temporomandibular disorders in adults. She has achieved numerous high-quality research outputs and has an increasing national and international research profile in the areas of temporomandibular disorders and clinical education. Alana is experienced across a variety of research methodologies and paradigms, including qualitative and quantitative approaches, with a keen interest in knowledge translation across intra-professional, inter-professional, academic and industry settings.

I am Senior Lecturer in Endangered Languages, and convenor of the Graduate Certificate in Indigenous Language Revitalisation. I am also an active researcher, with several projects on Indigenous language revitalisation and maintenance in Central Australia and in Queensland.

My approach to both teaching and research is collaborative, community-guided and applied. This informed by my on-going self-reflexivity as a non-Indigenous woman and my experience living and working on unceded Kaurna, Arrernte, Warumungu, Warlpiri, Pintupi-Luritja country and, since moving to the University of Queensland in 2019, Jagera and Turrbal country.

I have supervisory expertise in Indigenous language revitalisation and the sociology of language, including languages in education, language policy and planning and language in the arts.

The research I am commited to generates both academic publications and high impact non-traditional research outputs. I have published 15 articles, 11 book chapters, 4 books, including a Warumungu learner's dictionary and a co-edited volume. I have co-developed and co-curated two exhibitions, created curriculum and learning materials, compiled a language teacher resource books and image bank for language, teaching, and co-authored commissioned reports and reviews in languages education and languages policy.

Professor Loc Do is a dentist and an oral epidemiologist with special interest in social and clinical oral epidemiology. He completed his PhD in Oral Epidemiology at the University of Adelaide. He was a lead investigator in the National Child Oral Health Study 2012-14 and the National Study of Adult Oral Health 2017-19.

Loc is currently Director of Research at the School of Dentistry, University of Queensland.

Research funding: Currently, he is the Chief Investigator A of four major NHMRC- and MRFF-funded research projects: a population-based birth cohort study investigating impact of socioeconomic inequality on child oral health, a longitudinal study investigating effect of early life exposure to fluoride, a study to investigate effectiveness of water fluoridation in Queensland, and a study to develop and implement a package to improve oral health in residents of Aged Care Facilities in Queensland and NSW.

Qualifications: BDS, MScDent, PhD

Research Interests: Oral epidemiological measurement of dental diseases Quantitative analysis of oral epidemiological data including multilevel analysis Risk and benefit trade-off in the use of fluorides in children Natural history of dental fluorosis Socio-economic inequality in oral health Oral health-related quality of life Smoking as a risk factor for periodontal diseases Effectiveness and safety of water fluoridation in children Complex systems science in dental research.

Awards and Honours: In 2025, Loc is the recipient of the International Association for Dental Research (IADR) Distinguished Scientist John Greenspan Global Oral Health Research Award. In 2022, Loc is the recipient of the International Association for Dental Research (IADR) Distinguished Scientist H Trendley Dean Award 2022. In 2023, his paper in Journal of Dental Research was awarded the IADR Abrey Sheiham Award for Distringuished Research in Dental Public Health.

Dr Truc (Peter) Do joined UQ Business School after having graduated from Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He has also been a visiting scholar at London Business School. His primary research lies in financial accounting domain. His is particularly interested in examining how cultural norms and peer interaction affect corporate outcomes, especially corporate information flow. He is also interested in examining the importance of business sustainability and employee welfare. He has published in UTD-24, FT-50, ABDC A* and A journals, including Journal of Accounting and Economics, Contemporary Accounting Research, Research Policy and Accounting & Finance. He is an editorial board member of Accounting and Finance academic journal. He has also been regularly invited to serve as referees for Contemporary Accounting Research, Accounting, Organizations and Society, Management Accounting Research, European Accounting Review, Journal of Business Finance and Accounting, British Accounting Review, Accounting & Finance, Journal of Business Ethics, Corporate Governance: An International Review, Accounting and Business Research, Australian Accounting Review (on behalf of CPA Australia), Pacific Accounting Review (where he was recognised with Outstanding Reviewer Award), etc. His research works have also been featured at many conferences around the world, including American Accounting Association (AAA) Conference, European Accounting Association (EAA) Congress, Accounting and Finance Association of Australia and New Zealand (AFAANZ) Conference, MIT Accounting Conference, Japanese Accounting Review Conference, Financial Research Network (FIRN) Conference, Vietnam International Conference in Finance and Chinese Accounting Professors' Association of North America (CAPANA) Conference. His research has also received media mention in the FinReg Blog (run by Duke University). He has been awarded various research grants by AFAANZ (Developing Researcher Grant) and CPA (Global Perspectives Research Programme). He is also the winner of the AFAANZ section of the InSPiR2eS Global Pitching Research Competition (IGPRC) (2021). He has been awarded Researcher Excellence Award (Early Career) and Excellence in Developing the Accounting Discipline by UQ Business School in 2022. He teaches Financial Accounting at the undegraduate and postgraduate levels. He is a Certified Practising Accountant (CPA) of Australia and a Chartered Accountant (CA) of Singapore.