Key personnel
Professor
Kerin O'Dea
Director
Professor O'Dea took up the position as Director of the Sansom Institute for
Health Research in early 2009. Her current research examines diet and
lifestyle in the prevention and treatment of non-communicable diseases
(obesity, type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular diseases), with a focus on
elucidating the causal pathways and identifying critical intervention
points. She has a particular interest in the therapeutic potential of
traditional diets - especially Aboriginal hunter-gatherer and Mediterranean
diets - and is committed to a research approach that spans the spectrum from
the basic biomedical to the population, and includes quantitative and
qualitative methodologies.
Professor O'Dea has held a number of senior
academic and research leadership positions over the past 20 years, including
Director of the Menzies Institute of Health Research in Darwin (2000-2005)
and has been an active part of numerous national committees over many years
advising government on health and medical research, Indigenous health,
nutrition, and diabetes.
Professor
Allan Evans
Pro Vice Chancellor, Division of Health Sciences
Professor Evans has been an academic at UniSA since 1992, taking on
various leadership positions and being promoted to Professor in
Pharmaceutics in 2003. In 2004 Allan became Head of the School of Pharmacy
and Medical Science and played an instrumental role in establishing the
Sansom Institute (now the Division-based Sansom Institute for Health
Research) and in supporting tremendous growth in the school's research
activity and teaching profile.
Professor Evans has a significant research career. He has more than 90
peer-reviewed publications with over 1,200 literature citations and has held
NHMRC and/or ARC grants on an ongoing basis since 1994. With broad research
interests including basic, clinical and commercial research into the better
use of medicines, as well as the development of new ways of using medicines
to treat skin cancer and kidney disease, Professor Evan's group has
attracted over $15 million in Category 1-4 research income to UniSA. He
continues to manage a number of exciting research projects, which regularly
lead to invited lectures at overseas conferences.
Professor Evans is currently non-executive Director of two spin-off
companies that he helped to form,
PharmaQest Pte Ltd and CPR Pharma Services Ltd, and has a keen interest
in supporting further engagement between the researchers of the Division and
the health, innovation, and medical diagnostic industries. He has continued
to teach Pharmacokinetics and Biopharmaceutics P 201 and as a former UniSA
course coordinator and program director, is well placed to continue
developing the Division's excellent array of undergraduate and postgraduate
programs in health and medical sciences.
Rachael
Penning-Bourne
Institute Manager
With a background in health and business and wide-ranging experience in the
tertiary research sector in Australia and abroad, Rachael Penning-Bourne is
responsible for managing the operations of the Institute. As well as driving
the Sansom's strategic and marketing activities, Rachael works closely with
researchers and external stakeholders on a range of business development
activities including business plans and governance.