Associate Professor Tamara Mackean and Professor Claire Roberts win big in the NHMRC’s Synergy Grant program, while other successes include a chemistry whiz wins national honours and a Flinders graduate is named In-House Lawyer of the Year.
Synergy of success for Flinders medical researchers
Several Flinders Health and Medical Research Institute researchers involved in projects addressing institutional racism in Australia’s healthcare system and reducing infertility and pregnancy complications have been successfully awarded funding from the National Health and Medical Research Council’s Synergy Grant program. The grants, worth $5 million each, will be administered by UNSW Sydney and the University of Adelaide respectively.
Led by Associate Professor Tamara Mackean from the College of Medicine and Public Health as part of her conjoint position with the George Institute for Global Health, the first project aims to reform the development and delivery of hospital care for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples by addressing implicit bias and institutional racism within Australian hospitals. The project also features Tirritpa Ritchie, Professor Jonathan Karnon and Dr Courtney Ryder as Associate Investigators. You can read more about the project here.
The second grant, featuring Flinders’ Professor Claire Roberts as Chief Investigator B and Dr Anya Arthurs as an Associate Investigator, will study interactions between cells of the early placenta and the mother’s uterus to gain new knowledge into the first weeks of human development in a bid to reduce infertility and pregnancy complications. You can read more about the project here.
Chemistry whiz wins big
Congratulations to Dr Harshal Patel, Postdoctoral Research Associate with the College of Science and Engineering, who was the 2022 recipient of the Cornforth Medal from the Royal Australian Chemical Institute (RACI).
Each year, the medal, bearing the words “For a Thesis on Chemical Research”, is awarded to an individual in recognition of their outstanding achievements in chemistry and to promote chemical communication.
The Board of the RACI awards the Cornforth Medal in honour of the work of Sir John Cornforth AC CBE FRS – an Australian-British chemist who won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1975.
Best in class for Flinders law grad
Flinders University law graduate Edwina Stevenson (nee Starck) has been named In-house Lawyer of the Year by the Association of Corporate Counsel (Australia).
Since graduating from Flinders in 2004, Edwina has led a successful career which has included working in commercial law enterprises across the financial, disability and tourism sectors.
Now working as in-house counsel for Pernod Ricard, Edwina advises in consumer law, industrial relations, privacy, food code compliance and brand management for such leading products as Mumm champagne and Jacob’s Creek labels. Some of you may recognise that Edwina also moonlights as a weekend newsreader on 5AA.