Queensland Postgraduate and ECR Conference speakers

We are excited to see presentations from established and emerging leaders in Australian medical research at the Queensland Postgraduate and ECR Conference.

Keynote speakers

Associate Professor Shyuan Ngo
Australian Institute for Bioengineering and Nanotechnology

Associate Professor Ngo leads a research program that aims to define the contribution of altered metabolic homeostasis to motor neuron disease (MND) pathophysiology and pathobiology – this is an area of research that she has pioneered globally. Her research integrates studies in people living with MND with studies in human-derived cell models (including stem cell-derived neurons, and human primary myosatellite cells and myotubes) and mouse models of MND. Associate Professor Ngo’s projects aim to decipher the molecular drivers of MND, and identify therapeutic strategies for MND. The translational nature of her research has led to the expediting of therapeutics into clinical trials. She is generous with her time to both the research and wider MND communities, and her contributions have recently been recognised through an MND Australia 30th Anniversary Lifetime Achievement medal.

Professor Kirsten Spann
Queensland University of Technology

Professor Spann is the Director of the Centre for Immunology and Infection Control in the QUT Faculty of Health, and also head of the respiratory virus research group. Her research has a focus on the interplay between viruses and the immune response, and virus transmission via aerosols and surface contamination. Professor Spann graduated from the University of Queensland with a PhD in 1997. She worked at CSIRO as a research fellow in aquaculture disease diagnostics and management before moving to the US in 2000 to take a position as a research scientist at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID). At NIAID, Professor Spann was involved in the generation of recombinant vaccine candidates for respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), a common childhood infection. In 2006 she returned to Australia to start her own research group at the Royal Children’s Hospital in Brisbane, focusing on respiratory viral infections. In 2015, she moved to QUT, where she holds a research and teaching position in the School of Biomedical Science and the Faculty of Health.

Oral presentations

Emtiaz Ahmed, The University of Queensland

Md Ashraful Alam, The University of Queensland

Jamie Bryant, University of the Sunshine Coast

Alexandra Davidson, Bond University

Wisam Dawood, Institute for Biomedicine and Glycomics

Chenping Du, Mater Research Institute

Monalisa Hota, Institute for Molecular Bioscience

Jacinta Macdonald, Institute for Biomedicine and Glycomics

Helen Mostafavi, Institute for Molecular Bioscience

Habeebah Owolabi, Griffith University

Laura Pernoud, University of the Sunshine Coast