Postgraduate profiles

Masako Tsubakihara is a recent PhD graduate and winner of the 2006 Bancroft Prize.	Swati Rajagopal is an Infection and Immunity student.	William Maina is a recent graduate of the Master of International Public Health program.
Professor Louise Baur is a paediatrician and researcher based at the Children's Hospital at Westmead.	Mark Elkins is the inaugural recipient of the Sir Zelman Cowen University Fund Prize for Discovery in Medical Research.	The Kolling Institute is the longest-established medical research institute in NSW.

Masako was born in Tokyo, Japan and moved to Sydney in 1996. She started down the path of medical research in the second year of her Medical Science degree, encouraged by academic staff of the School of Medical Sciences. As a result of this encouragement she applied for an Australian Heart Foundation scholarship to undertake short-term research in the field of cardiovascular diseases.

"This experience fuelled my passion for research", says Masako. Further encouragement led to her undertaking an Honours research project. She was mentored by Professor Cris dos Remedios of the Muscle Research Unit, who encouraged her to take her research further into a full PhD.

"The aim of my PhD was to understand gene expression changes that occur in human heart failure using gene expression profiling technology,” says Masako. During her PhD, the Faculty of Medicine provided the opportunity to travel abroad to learn cutting-edge techniques in gene expression profiling at Harvard University.

"In the future I intend to use all of the knowledge, skills and experiences I have obtained through my years of learning at the University of Sydney to better the human condition".

Masako was awarded the Bancroft Prize in 2006. Founded in 1923 by a bequest of from the late Louise Bancroft in memory of her husband Peter Bancroft MB, the $4000 prize is awarded annually by the Faculty of Medicine to students whose theses are passed without requiring any amendment.

Swati Rajagopal studied medicine in Bangalore India, undertaking postgraduate training in Internal Medicine in St Petersburg. She then came to Australia, starting work as a medical registrar in the Sydney South West Area Health Service.

"Immunology has always fascinated me so when this course came along I immediately grabbed the opportunity", says Swati. “The extraordinary diversity of student backgrounds was a big plus. With a mixture of students from fields of science and medicine, I have been able to understand both the scientific and medical concepts of the subject. And the faculty are so enthusiastic! It is an honour to be taught by professionals who are the best in the field".

"This program is recommended for scientists and medical students who wish to pursue their careers in clinical immunology and research", says Course Coordinator, Professor Jamie Triccas. "The study of immune systems is extremely critical in our quest to control diseases and improve quality of life.

Immunology plays a vital role, be it in the acceptance of new life-saving drugs, cutting-edge stem cell research to battle infections or organ transplantation to overcome physical abnormalities".

Swati will resume her work with the Sydney South West Area Health Service on completion of her course and plans to pursue her advanced clinical training in clinical immunology in Australia.

William Maina trained at the University of Nairobi Medical School where he was awarded a Bachelor of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery. He worked as a GP in public hospitals in Kenya, then later in public health, mainly in immunisation and communicable disease control.

"The challenges in the field were enormous being confronted with an ever increasing burden of communicable and non-communicable diseases, compounded by the increasing number of people living in Kenya with HIV/AIDS, TB and malaria. I felt I needed to train further in order to place these health issues in a global perspective and so chose the Masters in International Public Health (MIPH)".

"This course has been invaluable. I am now able", says William, "to analyse research publications and interpret data and relate them to the reality on the ground. I am also now in a position to look at diseases from different perspectives with both proximal and distal determinants in mind".

Since finishing the MIPH, William has returned to Kenya and is now the Head of the Division of Non-communicable Diseases in the Kenyan Ministry of Health.

"It's a daunting task," he says, "but with the knowledge and skills I acquired at the University of Sydney, I am coping very well and am really enjoying my new job."

Professor Louise Baur, paediatrician and researcher based at the Children’s Hospital at Westmead, has a long-standing interest in child and adolescent obesity. Her research team of eight (including two PhD students) is investigating the factors promoting the development of obesity and insulin resistance in children and young people, effective treatment options for affected children and young people and strategies for measuring physical activity in young children.

"The study of insulin resistance and obesity in children and adolescents is both immensely fascinating and intellectually stimulating on the one hand,” says Louise, "and highly relevant to clinical and population health needs on the other. Our research work has already highlighted the importance of physical inactivity, soft drink consumption and parental obesity on the development of excess weight gain in children followed over a five year period into early adolescence".

"One of our randomised controlled trials, the PEACH (Parenting, Eating and Activity for Child Health) Study, looks at the effect of a group-based parenting intervention in a community setting on weight outcomes in overweight and obese primary school children. The Loozit Study aims to improve weight outcomes in obese adolescents, again in a community setting".

Louise Baur is the founding editor-in-chief of the International Journal of Pediatric Obesity, the only journal of its kind internationally. She is also a Director of the NSW Centre for Overweight and Obesity (COO) which is involved in the population health, primary care and health service delivery aspects of obesity.

Mark Elkins, a PhD student in the Faculty of Medicine, is the inaugural recipient of the Sir Zelman Cowen University Fund Prize for Discovery in Medical Research. He won the $5000 prize for his leading role in a long-term trial establishing a novel and effective low-cost treatment for cystic fibrosis therapy.

The therapy uses hypertonic saline solution inhaled through a nebuliser for the treatment of cystic fibrosis. Administered twice daily over an extended period, the therapy reduces the recurring complications of the disease and improves the quality of life.

As a physiotherapist, Mark developed a personalinterest in the treatment of cystic fibrosis through his close contact with patients. It was the relationships he developed with these patients and the experience he gained of their battle with the disease, that drove him to investigate the new treatment.

According to Mark, "we saw a sustained improvement in lung function, a major reduction in the number of acute flare-ups of the infection in the lung, a reduced need for antibiotics to treat the flare-ups and fewer days off school or work due to illness".

Mark’s work has seen him represent the University at the 2005 BioVision conference in Lyon, where he was one of only 100 students selected worldwide.

"The calibre of the people working in the Faculty of Medicine has been the key. My supervisor has a joint appointment with Royal Prince Alfred Hospital and the University of Sydney, which means that I have access to renowned experts. The standard of research being done here is very high".

With some 50 postgraduate students across its various specialties and the main centre for biomedical research at Royal North Shore Hospital, the Kolling Institute is the longest-established medical research institute in NSW.

"Our aim at the Kolling is to find molecular solutions to medical problems", says Professor Robert Baxter, Head of the Institute. "Our research covers five major themes; cancer, including cancer genetics and cell biology, endocrinology and reproduction including growth hormone and growth factor, endocrinology and cell biology, endocrine cancers and perinatal medicine; renal and cardiovascular research, including renal complications in diabetes; hypertension and stroke research and cardiac technology concerning heart injury and repair; neuroscience including the physiology and cell biology of pain and the genetics of neuronal disease; and bone and joint research, including studies on arthritis and connective tissue.”

The Kolling has been a winner of substantial research funding from the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) and recently has had outstanding success in attracting senior fellowships, infrastructure grants and student support grants from the Cancer Institute NSW.

"At the Kolling we are small enough to allow easy communication amongst the research groups, yet large enough to attract substantial funding from the NSW Office of Science and Medical Research making it an attractive place to undertake medical research".