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Mike Gagan joined the University of Queensland in 2018 to pursue his abiding interests in tropical palaeoclimatology, natural hazards, neotectonics, and early human migration in Australasia. He received his BA in geology from UC Santa Barbara (1980) and then relocated to Australia to work with Elf Aquitaine Minerals Pty. Ltd. as an exploration geologist (1981-84) on the Sorby Hills (WA) carbonate-hosted lead-zinc-silver deposit. He completed his PhD at James Cook University (1990) on the marine geology of the Great Barrier Reef, and then held faculty appointments at the University of New England, Northern Rivers (1988-1991) and the Australian National University (1992-2017).

Since 1994, Mike has enjoyed an active scientific partnership with colleagues at the Indonesian Institute of Sciences (LIPI). The group uses geochemical tracers in raised-reef corals and speleothems to explore three Quaternary research themes: (1) the history of ocean temperature, salinity and palaeomonsoons in Australasia; (2) environmental impacts and early human dispersal; and (3) reconstructing great-earthquake cycles along convergent plate boundaries. The recent award of ARC Discovery grant DP180103762 will allow these topics to be further developed at UQ.

Professor Peter Galbraith has an outstanding profile in mathematics education. In research, Peter’s major contribution has been in the field of mathematical modelling and the teaching of modelling to secondary school students. Peter is widely recognised for his international leadership in mathematics education. He has served on the editorial board of Educational Studies in Mathematics since 1999.

I am a plant pathologist specialising in the study of fungal pathogens of all manner of plants from agricultural and natural settings. My research career has spanned various areas of interest from horticultural and agricultural crop diseases, the development of disease forecasting systems, the study of soil mycorrhizal fungi, the use of beneficial microbes in promoting soil health and plant disease management and the scholarship of teaching and learning.

A key area of development has been the investigation of dieback disorders of invasive woody weeds in the Australian landscape. This has resulted in the development of a bioherbicide for the invasive weed Parkinsonia and the establishment of a start-up company - BioHerbicides Australia (BHA). BHA now produces this bioherbicide (which is a registered product) and has developed a range of synthetic herbicide products along with the delivery technology required for field implementation. My research team bioprospects for new control agents for a range of woody weeds (there are many) and also explores the use of synthetic herbicides. My research takes me to many interesting locations in outback Queensland, the Northern Territory, Western Australia and New South Wales. I am interested in many weed species including mimosa bush, chinee apple, celtis, prickly acacia, athel pine, mesquite, leucaena, rubber vine and various cacti.

I have been Deputy Head of School (Gatton) since 2013 where my main function has been to support the HoS as we develop this school through a process of growth and change with recruitment of new staff, development of new processes and teams and create a true sense of collegiality across both campus locations. We have taken Agriculture at UQ from an international ranking of #7 in 2016 to #3 in 2022. Apart from administrative tasks, my key role is to support and develop new staff to settle into their academic jobs, assist them with achieving milestones and probation and manage their development of KPIs and career development.

Dr Alana Gall is a proud Pakana (Tasmanian Aboriginal) woman whose ancestral heritage links to the north-east coast of Lutruwita (Tasmania), and more recently, the Bass Strait Islands of Cape Barren and Flinders Island.

Alana is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the First Nations Cancer & Wellbeing Research team, and the Project Manager of the What Matters 2 Adults Implementation project. Alana’s research focusses on wellbeing and holistic health for Indigenous peoples globally. The aim of the WM2A-I study she is managing, is to test the most appropriate and effective methods for implementing the newly developed WM2Adults Wellbeing measure - the first nationally-relevant wellbeing measure developed specifically for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander adults.

Alana has a background in nutritional medicine and has more than 10 years’ experience in research, research translation, community engagement, health education and clinical consultation. Alana’s PhD thesis, titled Exploring Wellbeing from Indigenous Perspectives, centres primarily on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples’ wellbeing but also includes a focus on the domains of wellbeing for Indigenous peoples in Canada, Aotearoa (New Zealand) and the United States.

On a personal note, Alana is passionate about empowering others to take control of their own health and believes better health and wellbeing can be achieved at a population level through transdisciplinary approaches that adhere to holistic models of health and wellbeing. Alana is also passionate about education, understanding on both an academic and personal level, that this is one significant way to lift individuals, families and communities out of poverty – having hope for the future is imperative to good health and wellbeing. Due to this passion, Alana produced a free worksheet for children during the COVID-19 pandemic, in collaboration with Wingaru Kids about antimicrobial bush medicines and would love to collaborate in this space more.

Rosie is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at The University of Queensland Business School. Her research focuses on institutional disruption and the governance of disaster recovery, with particular attention to how policies and programs shape community resilience.

She completed her PhD in Strategy at The University of Queensland, examining how communities in New South Wales responded to institutional disruption during the 2019–2020 bushfires and 2022 Northern Rivers floods. Her research demonstrated how institutional failure contributed to sensemaking breakdown, leaving residents uncertain, unsupported, and forced to improvise their own responses. These community-led efforts were shaped by strong attachments to place and the mobilisation of local resources. The study developed a process model of improvised place custodianship, offering new insight into how people navigate governance breakdowns during extreme weather events.

Rosie has taught at UQ since 2018 across a range of management, strategy, and marketing courses. She is currently involved in evaluating large-scale disaster recovery programs, analysing how resilience and reconstruction strategies are implemented on the ground. Her work explores how responsibility for resilience is shared across governments, communities, and industries as extreme weather events become more frequent and severe.

Guided by a research ethos grounded in care and engaged scholarship, Rosie is committed to bridging research and practice to support more accountable, equitable, and locally informed disaster recovery efforts.

Marcus Gallagher is an Associate Professor in the Artificial Intelligence Group in the School of Information Technology and Electrical Engineering. His research interests are in artificial intelligence, including optimisation and machine learning. He is particularly interested in understanding the relationship between algorithm performance and problem structure via benchmarking. My work includes cross-disciplinary collaborations and real-world applications of AI techniques.

Dr Gallagher received his BCompSc and GradDipSc from the University of New England, Australia in 1994 and 1995 respectively, and his PhD in 2000 from the University of Queensland, Australia. He also completed a GradCert (Higher Education) in 2010.

Victor is a Postdoctoral researcher at The University of Queensland, with a clinical and academic background in rehabilitation medicine, public health, and digital health equity. His research focuses on enhancing healthcare access for culturally and linguistically diverse communities, particularly through the development of telehealth innovations and inclusive service design. He has experience teaching public health and epidemiology to medical students and mentoring postgraduate researchers. Victor has co-authored peer-reviewed publications, contributed to national surveys, and helped develop validated tools, including the Digital Health Acceptability Questionnaire.

He completed his Medical Doctor degree in Peru, followed by a specialisation in Rehabilitation Medicine, and later earned a Master of Public Health and a PhD from UQ. His doctoral research explored equity in telehealth access and was supported by multiple competitive scholarships and grants. Victor has also held leadership roles in Peru’s national health system and sports medicine programs, including the PanAmerican Games Lima 2019. His work has been recognised through awards for research excellence, equity, and inclusion.

Dr. Andrés Gambini graduated with honors as a veterinarian at the University of Río Cuarto, Argentina, in 2008. After a period on an equine farm, he completed a Ph.D. program at the University of Buenos Aires (UBA) and taught in Animal Production Department. His Ph.D. focused on in vitro embryo production in horses. He produced the first cloned horses born in South America in 2010 and Australia in 2018. In 2015, he started a two years postdoc at the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS) in the USA, where he investigated mechanisms governing embryonic genome activation in mammals. Andrés was invited as a professor at the University of Torino in Italy and the University of Cordoba in Spain. He continues his research in animal cloning, ICSI, and other reproductive biotechnologies. He recently reported the first cloned zebra embryos worldwide. He stood as Assistant Professor at the University of Buenos Aires, providing more than twelve years of lecturing, and mentoring undergraduate and postgraduate students in areas of animal physiology and reproduction. Currently, he is a senior lecturer in Animal Science, School of Agriculture and Food Sciences at University of Queensland, Australia.

Maher Gandhi received his medical degree in the UK in 1989, and then trained as a haematologist, including a Fellowship in malignant haematology at Princess Margaret Cancer Centre, Toronto. He was awarded a PhD in immunology at Cambridge University under Patrick Sissons. He moved to Brisbane and from 2003-2024 worked as a Senior Staff Specialist (Pre-Eminent Status) in the Haematology / Oncology Department of the Princess Alexandra Hospital. He leads his own laboratory group and has established an international reputation studying the tumour immune microenvironment in lymphoma and its manipulation, with continuous NHMRC/MRFF funding since 2005. He was Chair of Laboratory Sciences for the Australasian Leukaemia and Lymphoma Group between 2010-2016, won the prestigious Australian Society of Medical Research Clinical Research Award in 2010 and in 2012 took up the inaugural John McCaffrey Cancer Council of Queensland / Office of Health and Medical Research Clinical Research Fellowship. Between 2011-2014 he was privileged to serve as Chair of the Metro South Human Research Ethics Committee. In 2013 he was appointed Professor of Experimental Haematology, University of Queensland, based at the Translational Research Institute, in 2014 became the inaugural Leukaemia Foundation Chair of Blood Cancer Research at the University of Queensland Frazer Institute, and was appointed Cancer Program Head in 2016. In 2018 he became Executive Director and Director of Clinical Research at Mater Research. He also continues to head the Blood Cancer Research Group, which is based in Mater Research. In 2025 to current, he was appointed Chief Executive Officer of the Translational Research Institute and its manufacturing branch TM@TRI, to serve Queenslanders by transforming health through collaborative research.

Dr Elise Gane graduated with a Bachelor of Physiotherapy (Honours Class I) and a University Medal for academic achievement from The University of Queensland in 2008. She worked as a physiotherapist at the Princess Alexandra Hospital (2009-2013), a quaternary public hospital, treating complex patients across the continuum of care from Intensive Care and post-surgical wards to inpatient rehabilitation and outpatient services. In 2014, Elise commenced her PhD with The University of Queensland, focussed on measuring the musculoskeletal side effects at the neck and shoulder that result from neck dissection surgery for head and neck cancer. Following the awarding of her PhD in early 2018, Elise was employed as a post doctoral researcher at the RECOVER Injury Research Centre (UQ) exploring return to work and social roles after road traffic crash. Since January 2019, Elise has fulfilled the role of Physiotherapy Conjoint Research Fellow between the School of Health and Rehabiltiation Sciences (UQ) and the Princess Alexandra Hospital Physiotherapy Department. In this role, Elise mentors physiotherapists in health service-based research (both qualitative and quantitative) whilst also pursuing her own research interests, including a telehealth cancer exercise program. She teaches a research course in systematic review methodology to students in the Physiotherapy Graduate Entry Masters program.

Elise's areas of research interest include codesign, implementation science, allied health led-models of care, oncology rehabiltiation, lymphoedema, chronic disease, physical activity (particularly in rehabilitation settings, chronic disease, or the workplace), and musculoskeletal health.

As a higher education curriculum thought leader and transformation expert, I am dedicated to empowering university educators to enhance student learning outcomes. By cultivating and driving global recognition of teaching expertise, I shape current and future university education.

As the Academic Lead for Advancing Teaching at UQ’s Institute for Teaching and Learning Innovation (ITaLI), I design programs that enhance teaching excellence. Through these programs, my leadership and expertise impact governance, curriculum innovation, and has shaped inclusive academic communities within and beyond UQ.

My research impacts Higher Education globally and focuses on recognising and rewarding teaching expertise, shaping policies across higher education institutions. I have contributed to 24 curriculum reviews of academic programs, published 84 scholarly works, secured $1.9M in funding to investigate and innovate university education practices, and spearheaded international collaborations that influence teaching recognition and career progression globally.

A dedicated mentor, I have supported over 700 UQ staff in achieving HEA Fellowships, guided senior leaders globally in attaining their Principal Fellowship status. I have established similar schemes in partnership with 8 universities across in Australia, New Zealand, Hong Kong and the UK.

Professor Brenda Gannon is an international interdisciplinary leader providing evidence and solutions for health and social care systems, spanning across economics, medicine and social science, in collaboration with academia and industry. She brings extensive experience and expertise in program and policy development related to health and ageing, social inclusion, and citizen science, fostering and advancing excellence at the intersection of many disciplines.

Working at the interface of health service delivery, strategic planning and practice influence, and health economics more broadly, across many sectors, enables her research to inform optimisation of health care and workforce organisation. The models are translatable and transferrable across many sectors, including ageing, mental health, child and the working populations.

She is a Professor in the School of Economics and an Affiliate Professor at the Mater Research Institute, The University of Queensland. She is also an affiliate member of CEPAR (ARC Centre for Research Excellence in Population Ageing Research). Since 2022, she is Honorary Adjunct Professor at University of Galway, Ireland. She was Director of Research in the School of Economics from 2018-2023. . She has developed a range of projects on topics of dementia, physical activity and cognition, health and health care utilization, and consumer directed care and home care. She has led and worked extensively on interdisciplinary research with gerontologists,several clinicians and methodologists. Her work has been influential in the development of programs for falls preventions and informing policy on disability and social inclusion, and has positively impacted on the health of many older people across the world. Her work also spans across the lifecyle from birth, and she has worked with clinicians on trials for newborns with breathing difficulities. She is the Health Economics and Epidemiology lead for the Queensland Family Cohort (QFC) Study, the pilot led by Mater Research, and is on the QFC Governance Committee, focusing on maternal mental health, inequalities of opportunity, alcohol use and related health care use and costs.

Professor Gannon’s research carries a dual role, (1) as an applied health economist using big and complex data, utilising health economics theory and concepts to test the validity of causal hypotheses, (2) collaborator across all Faculties leading critical economic evaluations. Her research is funded by her position as chief investigator on projects from the Australian Research Council, National Health and Medical Research Council, MRFF, EU H2020, Health Research Board, Ireland and the National Institute for Health Research, UK. She is the lead economist on projects in dementia, emergency care and paediatric care. All studies incorporate methodological innovations and applied research. She has provided advice to government at senior levels, and had a Ministerial appointment, on the Medical Services Advisory Committee Evaluation Sub-Committee 2017-2021. She sits regularly as a panel member of various NHMRC and MRFF grant review committees and has also previously appointed to the EU Commission grant panels. She has been invited to give several talks at international fora, including a key note talk on ageing and longevity at the National Academy of Medicine, Global Roadmap to Healthy Longevity, in Washington DC. Professor Gannon was an elected Professorial member of the Academic Board at UQ 2018-2022. In 2023, Professor Gannon was elected a Fellow of the Queensland Academy of Arts and Sciences. She has been elected as a Council Member of Queensland Academy of Arts and Sciences since 2024. In 2023, she led a symposium on Economics of Dementia Care, with international colleagues, in collaboration with Dementia Australia.

Dr Mile Gao is a physicist specialising in condensed matter physics, with a focus on charge carrier dynamics in organic semiconductor devices. His research advances the development of novel measurement techniques to improve the understanding of organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) and organic photovoltaics (OPVs). He has pioneered several charge carrier mobility measurement methods, including Metal-Insulator-Semiconductor CELIV (MIS-CELIV), photo-MIS-CELIV, injection-CELIV, and photo-injection-CELIV. These techniques enable precise characterisation of charge transport and generation processes in diode-like structures, addressing key challenges in organic optoelectronics.

Dr. Mile's work has led to significant insights into charge injection, extraction, and mobility in organic semiconductors, with implications for improving device efficiency and stability. His research is highly interdisciplinary, combining physics, materials science, and device engineering.

He has published extensively in high-impact journals and holds a patent for his contributions to the field. As an ARC DECRA Fellow at The University of Queensland, he also teaches and supervises students in advanced experimental techniques for semiconductor characterisation.

Expertise:

• Charge transport in organic semiconductors
• Carrier generation efficiency in OPVs
• Advanced electrical characterisation techniques
• Organic optoelectronic device physics