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517
Faculty of Science
Students
Postdoctoral
13
Doctoral
43
Master’s
26
Honours
22
Undergraduate
282
Total
386
Research fields and staff
Permanent Staff
Associate Professor Vernon Coyne
Head of Department; Marine biotechnology
Professor Jill Farrant
Desiccation tolerance; resurrection plants; seeds; plant
physiology; molecular biology; systems biology
Professor Janet Hapgood
Molecular mechanisms of cell signalling and eukaryotic
gene regulation via steroid receptors: role in HIV
pathogenesis, immune and reproductive function
Professor Nicola Illing
Evolution of development; regulation of gene expression;
limb development, comparative genomics
Professor Edward Rybicki
Plant- and tissue culture-derived vaccines; oceanic viromics;
Human papillomavirus (HPV); rotavirus; bluetongue virus;
Beak and feather disease virus; geminivirus; Maize streak
virus; molecular virology; molecular biotechnology
Associate Professor Val Abratt
Bacteroides fragilis; nitrogen metabolism; virulence;
metronidazole; DNA damage and repair; Bifidobacterium;
Lactobacillus; probiotics
Associate Professor Sharon Reid
Gram-positive and anaerobic bacteria; Clostridium
acetobutylicum; Bifidobacterium; Lactobacillus, gene
regulation of nitrogen- and carbon-substrate utilisation;
probiotics; molecular systematics; biofuels
Dr Robert Ingle
Senior lecturer; interactions between plants and
their environment (plant innate immunity, metal
hyperaccumulating plants)
Dr Paul Meyers
Senior lecturer;actinobacteria; familyStreptosporangiaceae;
Amycolatopsis; Kribbella; Streptomyces; bacterial
taxonomy; bioprospecting; novel antitubercular antibiotics
Dr Colleen O’Ryan
Senior lecturer; molecular and population genetics;
genetics of neurodevelopmental disorders
Dr Laura Roden
Senior Lecturer; flowering time and photoperiodism; plant
and human circadian rhythms; regulation of plant gene
expression; plant molecular biology; Arabidopsis genetics
Dr Thomas Oelgeschläger
Lecturer; molecular mechanisms of RNA polymerase II
transcription regulation in eukaryotes; core promoter-
selective transcription regulation mechanisms; transcription
regulation in Plasmodium falciparum
Dr Suhail Rafudeen
Lecturer; abiotic stress tolerance in plants; signalling
and regulation of plant gene expression during stress;
plant molecular biology; proteomics (protein expression
profiling, protein mining); Xerophyta viscosa; maize; Tef
Dr Jerry Rodrigues
Lecturer; protein chemistry; drug discovery; plant
desiccation tolerance; polyphenol research
Dr Zenda Woodman
Lecturer; HIV: structure-function and viral fitness;
biochemical analysis of envelope’s role in HIV pathogenesis
Honorary Staff
Emeritus Professor Horst Klump
Energy landscapes of dynamic ensembles of rolling triplet
repeat bulge loops: implications for DNA expansion
associated with mental-disease states
Emeritus Professor Jennifer Thomson
Transgenic maize for resistance to the African Maize streak
virus and tolerance to drought
Contract Research Staff
Dr Gareth Everest
Postdoctoral fellow; antimycobacterial antibiotic drug
discovery; actinobacterial characterisation; phylogeny of
the family Pseudonocardiaceae; alternative taxonomic
marker genes
Dr Bruna Galvão
Postdoctoral fellow; discovery and characterisation of
novel putative virulence factors of the human opportunistic
pathogen Bacteroides fragilis; membrane-associated
adhesins; cell surface appendages; proteases