Young scientists to attend 68th Lindau Nobel Laureate Meeting

Eight rising stars of Australian science have been selected to attend the 68th Lindau Nobel Laureate Meeting — a highly prestigious annual gathering of Nobel Laureates and promising young scientists from around the world.

Selected by the Australian Academy of Science and the Council for the Lindau Nobel Laureate Meetings, the Australian delegation will join 592 other scientists, all under the age of 35, to present their research to Nobel Laureates and their colleagues, exchange ideas and share experiences with other young researchers. This year’s meeting will be dedicated to physiology and medicine.

The PhD students and postdoctoral researchers selected to attend the meeting are as follows:

• Lee Ashton, a postdoctoral researcher from the University of Newcastle, who is researching participation-based lifestyle interventions to improve the health of young men.
• Ryan Farr, a postdoctoral fellow from CSIRO Geelong, who is identifying and characterising biomarkers of viral encephalitis, like the Rabies virus, to enable early treatment.
• Jessica Kretzmann, a PhD student from the University of Western Australia, who is working on developing a safe and efficient method to deliver gene therapies to treat breast cancer.
• Hayley McNamara, a PhD student from the Australian National University, who is researching how immune cells respond to parasites so that improved vaccines can be developed to combat malaria.
• Gregory Quaife-Ryan, a PhD student from the University of Queensland, who is focusing on the role of long non-coding RNAs in cardiac regeneration.
• Elena Schneider, a postdoctoral research fellow at the University of Melbourne, who is researching treatment options for cystic fibrosis and multidrug resistance.
• Amy Shepherd, a PhD student at the Florey Institute of Neuroscience and Mental Health, who is researching Alzheimer’s Disease, utilising specialised rodent touchscreens to look at specific cognitive deficits.
• Yuan Zhou, a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Tasmania, who is identifying genetic variants and environmental factors that influence the development of multiple sclerosis.

This year’s meeting will be attended by 84 countries, with 43 Nobel Laureates set to take part — the most ever at a medicine meeting. Furthermore, 50% of the young scientists attending this year are women.

Professor Andrew Holmes, president of the Australian Academy of Science, said the Lindau meetings are globally recognised for providing inspirational role models to young researchers.

“These meetings give young researchers the opportunity to interact with their scientific heroes, exchange ideas, gain exposure to areas in their chosen disciplines, and establish new contacts and networks with their peers,” Professor Holmes said.

The meeting has also received a glowing review from PhD student Andrew White from the University of Queensland, who attended last year’s event and was impressed by the message from several Laureates about the importance of basic research.

“They all mentioned that when they first made their discoveries their papers were not accepted by the scientific community for some time, and were sometimes even ridiculed by other scientists because their discovery were against the norm,” said White. “In order to make their groundbreaking discoveries they needed to focus on research areas that people perceive as impossible or too difficult to do.”

The meeting will be held in Lindau, Germany, from 24–29 June 2018. Successful candidates receive a grant towards the cost of airfares, participation in the meeting and a post-meeting study tour, led by renowned Australian scientist Professor Jennifer Martin, made possible thanks to the support of the Science and Industry Endowment Fund (SIEF).

Pictured: PhD student Jessica Kretzmann from the University of Western Australia.