La Trobe wins seven Future Fellowships
- September 2009
La Trobe University has won seven of the first round of 200 Australian Research Council (ARC) Future Fellowships. The Federal Government, through the Australian Research Council, instituted the Future Fellowships scheme to provide greater opportunities in Australia. It provides 200 Fellowships a year for the five years between 2009 and 2013. The stated aim is 'to promote research in areas of critical national importance by giving outstanding researchers incentives to conduct their research in Australia.'
And La Trobe University, with seven Future Fellows, did extremely well - the ninth largest number for any institution, and better than many more highly fancied organisations. The resulting grant income amounts to nearly $5 million.
Five of the Future Fellows are from the School of Molecular Sciences' Department of Biochemistry or will be associated with the new La Trobe Institute of Molecular Science (LIMS). They are:
Dr Suzanne Cutts in the Department of Biochemistry, who will probe how to increase the efficiency of a long used group of anti-cancer compounds, the anthracyclines. She is hoping to develop a means of delivery to ensure that these compounds kill only tumour cells.
Dr Christine Hawkins in the Department of Biochemistry, who will be studying the molecular control of apoptosis or programmed cell death in the face of viral infection, where cells are induced to commit suicide thereby preventing spread of the virus. Compounds which regulate apoptosis may be attractive as anti-viral and anti-cancer targets, useful both in medicine and agriculture.
Dr Hamsa Puthalakath in the Department of Biochemistry, who is studying another aspect of apoptosis, focused on a regulatory compound, known as Bim, which has been implicated in many different cancers. Bim actually suppresses tumours, but problems arise when the gene responsible for it mutates or becomes less active.
Dr Colin Smith, who is coming from Germany's Max Planck Institute to join the Department of Archaeology and LIMS, studies molecules trapped in time, such as proteins in bones from archaeological sites. The structures and atomic types included in these molecules can provide clues as to ancient diets, environments and health, and are particularly relevant to the study of climate change.
Dr Kaye Truscott in the Department of Biochemistry, who will be investigating the mechanisms which ensure molecular quality control in the cell's energy factories, the mitochondria. Disruption of such mechanisms is at the heart of many degenerative diseases.
La Trobe's other Future Fellows are:
Dr Linda Bennett of the Australian Research Centre in Sex, Health and Society, who will be investigating infertility in Indonesian women and its impact on their lives. Greater understanding of this problem should lead to improvements in infertility care.
Dr Birgit Hellwig of the Research Centre for Linguistic Typology, who is looking at how the people who use the Baining family of languages in Papua New Guinea classify the world around them. Her studies should not only provide insight into how these groups of people think, but should also shed light on their history and interrelationships.
Media contact:
Tim Thwaites
Media and Publications Officer
Faculty of Science, Technology and Engineering
Phone: 03 9479 2199
Mobile: 0421 488 816
Email: t.thwaites@latrobe.edu.au
