NHMRC awards Peter Mac $21million for research
26 February 2025
Peter Mac researchers have been awarded an incredible $21 million in funding as part of the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) 2025 Investigator Grants scheme.
Professor Ricky Johnstone, Executive Director of Cancer Research at Peter Mac, said the researchers at Peter Mac clearly impressed the NHMRC peer review panel with an astonishing nine projects receiving funding.
“Investigator Grants provide the highest performing researchers with important salary support and research direct costs that allow them to pursue their ideas to drive better outcomes for cancer patients," Professor Johnstone said.
“We had an incredible success rate of 36 percent of applications funded this year with recipients ranging from emerging research leaders through to established researchers across a breadth of areas.
“The majority of the grants were awarded to clinical researchers which highlights depth of talent that exists at Peter Mac and our ability to combine treatment care insights with research.
“However, we are very conscious that there were many excellent research proposals that just missed out on funding and a number of outstanding laboratory scientists in particular were desperately unlucky not to receive funding in this round.”
Professor Johnstone congratulated Dr Nikki Burdett, Dr Katie Fennell, Professors Michael Hofman, Sherene Loi, Grant McArthur, Kelly Anne Phillips, Danny Rischin and Jeanne Tie, and Associate Professor Paul Beavis on receiving grant funding.
“We have an exciting portfolio of funded research projects and I look forward to seeing the outcomes over the coming years and the impact it will have on people living with cancer,” he said.
NHMRC CEO, Professor Steve Wesselingh, said that Investigator Grants are highly sought after as they provides recipients with certainty, security and flexibility to pursue an ambitious research program across a 5-year period.
“NHMRC funds investigator-led research where Australia’s highest performing health and medical researchers set out to achieve ambitious goals of improving the health and wellbeing of the Australian community,” Professor Wesselingh said.
Peter Mac research projects receiving 2025 NHMRC Investigators Grants:
Researcher: Professor Danny Rischin
Summary: Immunotherapy has improved survival of patients with incurable advanced skin and head and neck squamous cell cancers. My research is focused on further improving outcomes including determining the role of adding immunotherapy in patients with earlier stages of these cancers that are curable with major surgery and/or radiotherapy combined with chemotherapy. These approaches may improve survival in skin cancer, and decrease the intensity of treatment for skin and base of tongue/tonsil cancers.
Researcher: Professor Grant McArthur
Summary: Drug therapies that target molecules that initiate the growth of melanoma have been highly successful but suffer from the limitation that resistance often develops. The project will investigate why cells are not eradicated and develop new and specific treatment approaches to reverse this. The project will also discover new markers predicting the risk of development of metastases to allow personalised follow up and carefully tailored use of therapies to prevent metastases.
Researcher: Professor Jeanne Tie
Summary: I am leveraging my world leading studies of liquid biopsy testing in bowel cancer as a marker to predict cancer relapse, to further improve patient selection for treatment, both in terms of who to treat and what treatment to use. Using state-of-the-art technology, I will also improve the understanding of how cancer cells become resistant to chemotherapy and targeted therapy, which will facilitate the development of new treatment.
Researcher: Professor Sherene Loi
Summary: Breast cancer is a major health and economic issue globally, leading to significant mortality in women. My five-year research plans to understand how the immune system works to combat breast cancers. I will study how specific immune cells can detect and control the disease, and factors influencing their presence in the breast. My goal is to enhance the effectiveness of current immunotherapy regimens, with the goal of reducing breast cancer incidence, and improving patient outcomes.
Researcher: Dr Katie Fennell
Summary: Cancer cells can change their behaviour in response to therapy, a process called "cellular plasticity." This adaptability results in metastatic disease and treatment resistance. Targeting these plastic cells could be a new way to treat cancer. My aim is to understand how “plasticity” occurs by using advanced molecular techniques to discover new pathways and targets associated with these particular cancer cells. The end goal of my research is to improve outcomes for breast cancer patients.
Researcher: Professor Michael Hofman
Summary: This research aims to dramatically improve outcomes for patients with prostate cancer, which currently exceed 3500 in Australia annually, by using a technology called theranostics. Theranostics uses radioactive tumour seeking molecules to integrate whole body scanning and a targeted treatment. I will develop new radioactive molecules, perform clinical trials and use artificial intelligence, focussing on approaches with potential for global approval and adoption in less than 5-10 years.
Researcher: Dr Nikki Burdett
Summary: Ovarian cancer is an area of urgent need for new and effective treatments. I previously found that ovarian cancers which develop whole genome duplication (WGD) early have features that allow cancer cells to hide from the body’s immune system. These patients also have the worst prognosis. My research will explore the differences in ovarian cancer cells with WGD, assess changes linked with WGD even before the cancer is diagnosed, and look for therapeutic targets to treat cancers with WGD.
Researcher: Professor Kelly-Anne Phillips
Summary: Breast cancer affects 1 in 8 Australian women. Of all the cancers, breast cancer results in the largest number of years of healthy life lost from death and illness. My research will reduce this unacceptable burden of breast cancer for women and their families. Spanning prevention, through treatment to survivorship, it will facilitate reduced breast cancer incidence, better treatments and enhanced understanding of the effects of new treatments on ovarian function and fertility.
Researcher: Associate Professor Paul Beavis
Summary: This project will enhance the effectiveness of a type of immune based therapy where a patient’s own immune cells are genetically engineered to recognise and kill cancer cells. One key advance will be the application of advanced cellular engineering methodologies to improve existing gene therapies. If successful, the developed technologies could be rapidly applied to patients afflicted by a range of cancers including multiple myeloma, sarcoma and lung cancer.