NHMRC awards $31m for innovative health and medical research
28 grants in total, including 24 Ideas grants, 3 Development grants, and a National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Collaborative Research Grant have been awarded.
Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research), Professor Emma Johnston congratulated all of the researchers who were awarded funding and looks forward to seeing how each project continues to advance.
“Sydney is proud to have longstanding strength in health and medical research. Our academics were amongst the first to link melanoma and latitude, laid the early groundwork for the bionic ear and discovered that, together with a genetic predisposition, allergens in the environment trigger asthma.”
“I look forward to seeing these new research projects get off the ground and how they will make an impact in the years to come", said Professor Emma Johnston.
The NHMRC (NIHR) Collaborative Grant supports Australian participation in international collaborative research through the United Kingdom’s Health Technology Assessment Programme.
Professor David Beard from the Faculty of Medicine and Health was awarded a $2.54 million NIHR Collaborative Grant to explore stratified accelerated repairs of the Anterior Cruciate Ligament for knee injuries.
The NHRMC Ideas Grants support researchers at all career stages undertaking innovative and creative research projects in any area of health and medical research from discovery to implementation.
The 24 Ideas Grant awardees are:
Professor Stephen Alexander from the Faculty of Medicine and Health has been awarded $1.4 million to explore gene therapy strategies for genetic kidney disease and transplantation using novel patient avatar mouse models.
Professor Jennifer Byrne from the Faculty of Medicine and Health has received $442,000 to research problematic articles and literature reviews in molecular cancer research.
Dr Troy Cross from the Faculty of Medicine and Health has been awarded $942,000 for his project Extreme Heat and Bushfire Smoke supporting the establishment of evidence-based acute PM2.5 thresholds.
Associate Professor Anthony Don from the Faculty of Medicine and Health, and the Charles Perkins Centre has received $1.2 million to examine a new paradigm for how APOE genotype affects brain lipid homeostasis and dementia risk.
Professor Carl Feng from the Faculty of Medicine and Health and the Charles Perkins Centre has received $1 million to support untangling the complexity of granulomas in human mycobacterial diseases.
Professor Mathias Francois from the Faculty of Medicine and Health has been awarded $1.2 million to assist targeting endothelial trans-differentiation in vascular lesions.
Professor Andrew Harman from the Faculty of Medicine and Health, and the Charles Perkins Centre has received $1.56 million to assist defining the role of antigen presenting cells in Crohn’s Disease.
Dr Daniel Hesselson from the Faculty of Medicine and Health has received $956,000 for his project Enhancing heart repair to treat cardiomyopathies examining the directed evolution of human KLF1 to increase cardioregenerative potency.
Professor Michael Kassiou from the Faculty of Science, Brain and Mind Centre and the University of Sydney Nano Institute has received $1 million to develop senolytics for treatment of Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis.
Dr Mary Kavurma from the Faculty of Medicine and Health has been awarded $1.65 million to expand her research of peripheral artery disease.
Dr Mark Larance from the Faculty of Medicine and Health and the Charles Perkins Centre has received $747,000 to assist in the discovery of a new modification in the platelet proteome.
Dr Jennifer Li from the Faculty of Medicine and Health has received $902,000 to enhance precision medicine advancing renal transplantation.
Professor Christopher Little from the Faculty of Medicine and Health, and the Charles Perkins Centre has been awarded $959,000 for his project Getting to the Heart of Osteoarthritis (OA) targeting joint-derived micro-RNAs (miRs) to reduce OA-associated cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk.
Dr Grant Logan from the Faculty of Medicine and Health has been awarded $1.7 million to support his enabling universal access to AAV gene therapies by vector bio-engineering to escape pre-existing natural immunity.
Professor Joel Mackay from the Faculty of Science and the University of Sydney Nano Institute has been awarded $1.1 million to expand on the RaPID assessment of the chromatin remodeller CHD4 as a therapeutic target for hemoglobinopathies using a new target validation strategy.
Dr Najla Nasr from the Faculty of Medicine and Health has been awarded $1 million for a novel strategy to reactivate HIV in CD4 T cells via interferon alpha treatment.
Associate Professor Aaron Schindeler from the Faculty of Medicine and Health has received $1.45 million to explore gene therapy for Neurofibromatosis types 1 and 2.
Dr Erin Shanahan from the Faculty of Science and the Charles Perkins Centre has been awarded $1.15 million to investigate how microbe-immune interactions shape immune checkpoint inhibitor immunotherapy outcomes.
Dr Christopher Stanley from the Faculty of Medicine and Health has been awarded $1.49 million to support research examining Indoleamine 2,3-dioxygenase-1 (IDO1), a master regulator of severe endothelial dysfunction in sepsis.
Associate Professor Matthew Sunderland from the Faculty of Medicine and Health has received $498,000 to explore 40 years of data to revolutionise Australia’s response to increases in psychological distress.
Professor Lachlan Thompson from the Faculty of Medicine and Health has been awarded $1.1 million to investigate a better cell therapy for Parkinson's disease.
Dr Sicong Tu from the Faculty of Medicine and Health and the Brain and Mind Centre has received $936,000 to assist defining metabolite dysfunction in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.
Associate Professor Guoping Zheng from the Faculty of Medicine and Health has received $1 million to examine preventing kidney failure using BMP-7 engineered macrophages in chronic kidney disease.
Professor Hong Zhou from the Faculty of Medicine and Health has been awarded $850,000 to examine glucocorticoid rhythmicity and its critical role in bone loss and osteoarthritis during chronic disruption of circadian rhythm.
The NHMRC Development Grants provide financial support to individual researchers or teams to undertake research within Australia at the proof-of-concept stage, that specifically drives towards a commercial outcome. The scheme supports the commercial development of a product or procedure that will result in improved health care or disease prevention.
“It’s so pleasing to see these three leading scientists and their ground-breaking research recognised by NHMRC. Their projects will receive the much-needed support to expedite their journey from lab to market, making a real difference to the current commercial offerings in their respective fields and improving patient outcomes in the long-term”, said Pro-Vice-Chancellor (Research Enterprise), Professor Julie Cairney.
The University of Sydney was also recently recognised as the top university in Australia for bringing innovations to market.
The 3 Development Grant awardees are:
Professor Paul Keall, from the Faculty of Medicine and Health and the Image X Institute, has been awarded $668,892 to develop a deep learning targeting device for radiation therapy to improve cancer patient outcomes. The targeting device integrates with radiation therapy systems to enable real-time targeting of the motion of tumours within the human body during breathing and swallowing and will improve targeting for lung, liver and pancreas cancer patients.
Professor Richard Payne, from the Faculty of Science, the University of Sydney Nano Institute and the Charles Perkins Centre, has received $1.01 million to develop a synthetic human peptide that significantly reduces the pro-inflammatory activity of immune cells to deliver next generation topical therapy for inflammatory skin diseases such as psoriasis and atopic dermatitis.
Dr Pierre Qian, from the Faculty of Medicine and Health and the Westmead Applied Research Centre, has been awarded $1.2 million for his research into the Aurora Catheter which uses microwave energy to effectively destroy scars in the heart that cause Ventricular Arrhythmias, improving the quality of life and longevity for many patients with heart disease.
A full list of research projects administered by the University which received funding can be found on the NHMRC website.