Future Health Research and Innovation Fund

12/08/2021

A total of $5.03 million has been awarded to help Western Australian researchers achieve a competitive advantage to secure a highly sought after National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) grant.

The WA Near-miss Awards (WANMA) program targets emerging WA researchers who narrowly missed out on recent NHMRC grants.

For emerging researchers, securing a NHMRC grant is a critical career milestone, paving the way for further competitive funding.

The WANMA program is funded by the State’s Future Health Research and Innovation (FHRI) Fund, which provides a secure source of funding to drive health and medical research, innovation and commercialisation.

Forty-one researchers have received 2021 WANMA grants, each to the value of $74,000 for one year, with these grants intended to assist the recipients to enhance their application for resubmission to a future NHMRC selection round.

In addition, the four top-ranked NHMRC Investigator Grants near-miss applicants have been awarded Emerging Leaders Fellowships worth a combined maximum of nearly $2 million for research over a 19- to 31-month period.

The Emerging Leaders Fellowships funding will be used by the recipients to conduct the research they proposed to the NHMRC, while also reapplying to the peak body for further support.

WANMA grant recipients

Coordinating Principal Investigator	Administering Institution	Project Title	Funding Awarded
Emerging Leaders Fellowships
Dr Oyekoya Ayonrinde	The University of Western Australia	Determining factors that underpin poor health outcomes related to progression of nonalcoholic fatty liver disease and abdominal pain from adolescence into adulthood - a longitudinal cohort study	Up to $231,208
Adjunct Professor Christopher Brennan-Jones	The University of Western Australia	Healthy Ears for Healthier lives: Tackling ear disease and preventable hearing loss in Indigenous Australian children	Up to $749,063
Dr Fred Kuanfu Chen	The University of Western Australia	Preventing blindness from retinal degeneration: from clinic to bench to trials	Up to $688,557
Dr Jonatan Leffler	The University of Western Australia	Sex Hormones as Immune Modulatory Drivers in Transgender People	Up to $330,538
Near-miss Awards
Associate Professor Lucinda Black	Curtin University	Investigating diet and risk of onset and progression of multiple sclerosis	$74,000
Dr Catherine Bondonno	Edith Cowan University	Nitrate and human health - villain or superhero?	$74,000
Dr Erika Bosio	The University of Western Australia	A 3D multilayered blood vessel-on-a-chip model to investigate vascular dysfunction in sepsis	$74,000
Dr Livia Carvalho	The University of Western Australia	Validating novel treatments for cone-mediated vision loss	$74,000
Dr Yu Suk Choi	The University of Western Australia	Stiffness in the heart: Expanding cardiac mechanobiology to 3 dimensions	$74,000
Dr Olivier Clement	The University of Western Australia	Unravelling the (epi)genomic and physiological regulatory mechanisms governing memory processes to understand cognitive decline in ageing	$74,000
Associate Professor Pieter Eichhorn	Curtin University	Determining the effects of post-translational modification on phosphate and tensin homologue (PTEN) in P13K inhibitor resistant breast cancer	$74,000
Dr Rachel Foong	Curtin University	Determining prenatal and postnatal environment exposures that alter lung function in early life	$74,000
Dr Andrew Ford	The University of Western Australia	The Western Australian Lewy Body Study	$74,000
Dr Saskia Freytag	The University of Western Australia	Harnessing single cell technology to understand abnormal human cortical development	$74,000
Dr Lucy Furfaro	The University of Western Australia	Sewers to cures: Bacteriophage biology to guide future therapeutics	$74,000
Dr Cristina Gamez	The University of Western Australia	Pregnancy diet, antibiotic use and their effects on microbial signatures and immune health	$74,000
Dr Shelley Gorman	The University of Western Australia	Benefits, harm or no effect on cardiometabolic risk? Comparing the effects of low and high daily vitamin D supplementation with sun exposure in community-dwelling Australian adults with mild vitamin D-deficiency	$74,000
Dr Paula Hooper	The University of Western Australia	The Park Life PPGIS Project: A new idea for evaluation green space morphologies and policies designed for optimal health benefits	$74,000
Dr Rae-Chi Huang	The University of Western Australia	Early Life Prevention of Childhood Obesity and Lifelong Non-Communicable Diseases	$74,000
Dr Thomas Iosifidis	Curtin University	Prenatal reprogramming of respiratory epithelial progenitors and early postnatal respiratory disease	$74,000
Dr Yuliya Karpievitch	The University of Western Australia	AI- and XR- enabled Virtual Doctor for respiratory disease	$74,000
Associate Professor Pritinder Kaur	Curtin University	Developing a bioprinting solution for treating human skin loss	$74,000
Dr Omar Kujan	The University of Western Australia	Oral Cancer chemoprevention using a novel synergised nanotechnology and personalised medicine-based approach	$74,000
Dr Virginie Lam	Curtin University	Restoration of myelination in the central nervous system via the provision of specific dietary bioactive lipids	$74,000
Dr Timo Lassmann	The University of Western Australia	Personalised analytics to improve diagnostic rates in clinical sequencing	$74,000
Dr Jonatan Leffler	The University of Western Australia	Unravelling the male/female immune imbalance: mapping immune changes following gender transformation	$74,000
Associate Professor Joshua Lewis	Edith Cowan University	A novel machine-learning approach to reducing falls and their burden in older Australians	$74,000
Adjunct Clinical Professor Wai Lim	The University of Western Australia	Allo-antibody in kidney transplant recipients: is this the missing link for heart disease (AN-INSPIRE study)	$74,000
Dr Ivan Lin	The University of Western Australia	"Yarn with Me": Implementing Clinical Yarning Communication in Aboriginal Health Care	$74,000
Dr Herbert Ludewick	The University of Western Australia	Bordetella pertussis colonisation and influenza infection in the upper respiratory tract: Implications for pertussis resurgence	$74,000
Dr David Martino	The University of Western Australia	The role of BCG induced epigenetic changes in the protection from neonatal sepsis	$74,000
Dr Brioni Moore	Curtin University	Optimising antimalarial treatment strategies for children	$74,000
Dr Tenielle Porter	Edith Cowan University	The interaction of genetic and lifestyle factors affecting progression in neurodegenerative disorders	$74,000
Dr Kathryn Ramsey	The University of Western Australia	Improving outcomes in children with cystic fibrosis and bronchiectasis lung disease	$74,000
Dr Carrington Shepherd	Curtin University	Increasing the pace of change to equity in Aboriginal perinatal health: Evidence for advocacy and Intervention	$74,000
Dr Marc Sim	Edith Cowan University	Reducing falls and their burden in older Australians	$74,000
Dr Shannon Simpson	Curtin University	Unravelling the mechanisms underpinning lung function decline for survivors of very preterm birth	$74,000
Dr Gina Trapp	The University of Western Australia	Creating a geospatial 'Food Atlas' to map, measure and monitor food access	$74,000
Dr Kimberley Wang	The University of Western Australia	Fatty airway remodelling - the missing link in comorbid asthma and obesity	$74,000
Dr Roslyn Ward	Curtin University	Facilitating the diagnosis of speech sound disorders through automatic facial tracking and speech processing: A tool for speech language pathologists	$74,000
Dr Sarah Ward	The University of Western Australia	Defining melanoma subtypes based on interactions of germline variants and somatic mutations	$74,000
Assistant Research Professor Anna Waterreus	The University of Western Australia	Improving the physical health outcomes of people with severe mental illness; translating research into clinical practice	$74,000
Dr Andrew Woo	The University of Western Australia	Boosting platelet supply for transfusion: Cellular reprogramming approach	$74,000
Dr Yu Yu	Curtin University	What defects in Tyrosine Kinase Signalling predict drug resistance in Ovarian Cancer?	$74,000
Dr Yu Yu	Curtin University	Improving Recurrent Ovarian Cancer Outcomes by Targeting the Phosphoproteome	$74,000

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Last Updated: 12/08/2021

$5 million to boost emerging researchers’ bids for major Australian Government funding