Western Sydney University’s Associate Professor Tara Roberts from the School of Medicine and Associate Professor Antonio Lauto from the School of Science will lead two projects that together, have secured more than $2 million from the National Health and Medical Research Council’s (NHMRC) Ideas Grant scheme.
The Ideas Grant scheme funds world-class research with a focus on discovery and innovation, where teams work at the frontiers of knowledge to advance their field for the improvement of health.
Associate Professor Tara Roberts secured $1,582,740 to lead the project, ‘Combining liquid biopsy and radiomics to provide personalised management of PSMA-lutetium-177 treatment for metastatic prostate cancer patients’. The project will examine cancer DNA and cancer cells in blood and imaging data, then combine the data types with artificial intelligence to develop a method to predict which patients will respond to a new treatment, LuPSMA, which targets radiation to prostate cancer cells. Udit Nindra, a PhD student from the School of Medicine, will be the project’s Associate Investigator.
Associate Professor Antonio Lauto from the School of Science secured $749,157 to lead the project, ‘Wireless stimulator with no impinging electrodes, circuitry and connections for improving nerve regeneration in a crush injury model’. The project aims to prove that an innovative device (graft-antenna) can stimulate nerves non-invasively resulting in enhanced regeneration and fast recovery. The proposed outcomes of this project will accelerate the translation of our device towards clinical trials. Also named as investigators on the project are Associate Professor David Mahns from the School of Medicine and Associate Professor Gaetano Gargiulo from the School of Engineering, Design and Built Environment and the MARCS Institute.
Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research, Enterprise & International) Professor Deborah Sweeney congratulated both teams on their funding success.
“These innovative projects have the potential to profoundly improve human health and reflect Western’s commitment to translating our work into real-world impacts. I look forward to seeing the exciting outcomes and global impact of this work,” said Professor Sweeney.
A full list of funding outcomes for Ideas Grants is available on NHMRC’s Outcomes of funding rounds.
