What are the new research fellowships?
Through the Breakthrough T1D Australia Type 1 Diabetes Clinical Research Network (T1DCRN), we have awarded 7 researchers the Early Career Basic Researcher Fellowship 2026. These fellowships support the development of the best and brightest emerging researchers in Australia who can accelerate world-class research out of the lab and into the hands of people living with T1D.
Each Fellow has been awarded $150,000 over 2 years, which also supports a bespoke mentorship plan with tailored training and career development opportunities to foster their independence as researchers. These fellowships aim to boost the talents of the next generation of upcoming leaders in Australian T1D research to secure more breakthroughs in T1D science in future years.
Dr Dorota Pawlak, Chief Scientific Officer at Breakthrough T1D Australia, said:
“At Breakthrough T1D, we recognise the importance of nurturing researchers at the start of their career for the acceleration of scientific progress as well as supporting the talent in Australia to maintain the reputation and global recognition of Australian T1D research. By funding this fantastic group of researchers, we’re investing in the future of T1D research. These fellowships give these budding scientists a clear path to independence, helping them become future leaders in T1D research.
“It’s our role as Breakthrough T1D to maintain and replenish the pool of intelligent minds working day in and day out to deliver breakthroughs in T1D science that lead to meaningful change for the more than 135,000 Australians living with T1D.”
Meet the 7 new research fellows
1. Dr Jennifer Smith
Research project: Finding the earliest signs of the immune attack in T1D
Based at the University of Queensland, Dr Jennifer Smith’s area of expertise is the autoimmune process behind T1D, where immune cells mistakenly attack the insulin-making beta cells in the pancreas. Throughout her fellowship, Dr Smith will study how a child’s genetic background and prenatal environment shape the very first rogue immune cells involved in T1D development.
She will analyse umbilical cord blood samples from the ENDIA study, a Breakthrough T1D-funded program that’s following 1,500 children who have a close family member with T1D over 10 years. She hopes to identify reliable biological markers in newborns that could be used to develop a neonatal screening test that flags high-risk infants for closer monitoring or preventive treatment. She also hopes to reveal more about the biological pathways that guide immune cells to recognise our own cells to protect, and what causes invading cells, like viruses, to attack. This improved understanding could then be used to inform the design of therapies to prevent the autoimmune attack on beta cells.
2. Dr Prerak Trivedi
Research project: Guarding beta cell transplants with novel combination immunotherapies
Dr Prerak Trivedi has received numerous honours and awards and is currently at the Immunology & Diabetes Unit at St. Vincent’s Institute of Medical Research in Melbourne. Dr Trivedi’s recent research has found that inhibiting a molecule called perforin can protect beta cells from being attacked by immune cells. The world’s first perforin inhibitor has also recently been developed.
As part of his fellowship, Dr Trivedi is testing whether using the new perforin inhibitor to disable attacking immune cells can protect newly transplanted beta cells. Dr Trivedi will also target these immune cells with another immunotherapy in a novel combination therapy. If successful, these new therapies targeting immune cells could be used to protect transplanted beta cells from either organ donors or grown from stem cells. This would be an exciting development towards curing T1D.
3. Dr Dale Morrison
Research project: Can lactic acid predict who is at risk of T1D complications?
Dr Dale Morrison’s research at the University of Melbourne focuses on T1D complications. His career has progressed quickly with numerous awards and several scholarships, notably for his work to minimise exercise-related hypoglycaemia in people with T1D.
His fellowship project aims to determine if lactic acid (lactate), which is produced when glucose is broken down without oxygen, can be used to characterise insulin resistance in people with T1D. Insulin resistance is a risk factor for T1D complications like heart and blood vessel damage. New devices, called continuous lactate monitors, are similar to (and can be incorporated into) widely used continuous glucose monitors. If lactate is a predictor of insulin resistance, these monitors may be a simple way to identify individuals at risk of T1D complications, so they can be treated early.
4. Dr Mai Tran
Research project: What causes the autoimmune attack in T1D?
Dr Mai Tran, an immunologist at Monash University in Victoria, is investigating how tiny proteins present in the pancreas may be involved in the immune system mistaking the beta cells for harmful invading cells. This triggers a chain reaction where more immune cells are recruited, leading to the full-blown autoimmune attack that results in T1D.
In her fellowship, Dr Tran will seek to identify the key factors driving this abnormal immune response involved in T1D, which is essential to initiating T1D development. Her research will provide vital insights that could inform the design of immunotherapies to prevent this initial immune response before the autoimmune attack and beta cell damage can occur and cause T1D.
5. Dr Cindy Audiger
Research project: Can a certain immune cell prevent damage to beta cells in T1D?
Based at the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research in Victoria, Dr Cindy Audiger is an emerging leader in the biology of dendritic cells, a type of immune cell, and their use in vaccines.
In her fellowship, Dr Audiger aims to develop a new kind of cell therapy that teaches the immune system to stop attacking the pancreas. She uses a special type of immune cell called tolerogenic dendritic cell type 1 (Tol-DC1), which naturally helps the body recognise its own cells and prevents harmful immune attacks. She will grow human Tol-DC1 cells in the lab and test whether they can calm harmful immune responses. She will then test whether Tol-DC1 treatment can prevent damage to beta cells and slow disease progression in an animal model of T1D.
6. Dr Kevin Chemello
Research project: A new combined therapy to regenerate and protect beta cells
With a background spanning cardiovascular disease and diabetes, Dr Kevin Chemello is a researcher pivoting into T1D research at the University of New South Wales. During his fellowship, Dr Chemello will develop a combination therapy to regrow the beta cells lost in T1D. His approach uses a type of tiny protein called a peptide to drive the production of new beta cells, combined with the immunotherapy baricitinib. Baricitinib was found to preserve beta cell function in a world-first clinical trial here in Australia.
Dr Chemello will test his new therapy in human pancreatic cells and immune cells in the lab, making it more easily translational to people living with T1D.
7. Dr Preston Leung
Research project: Detecting people at high risk of T1D earlier than ever
Dr Preston Leung has a background in machine learning from his time working in Denmark, and is now based at the University of New South Wales. We can currently detect people who are in the early stages of developing T1D as we can test whether they have proteins called insulin autoantibodies in their blood. Dr Leung aims to identify who is at risk of developing insulin autoantibodies so they can be enrolled early in clinical trials hoping to prevent T1D.
First, Dr Leung will check whether the immune system’s reaction to a virus thought to trigger T1D can be found before insulin autoantibodies develop. He will then determine whether these signals are common among different populations. If this turns out to be the case, he might have found a way to distinguish between people who develop insulin autoantibodies and those who don’t, so they can receive treatment earlier than ever.
Hope for the future
By investing in these talented researchers at this early stage in their careers, we help keep bright minds focused on T1D research. This gives us the best chance of making scientific breakthroughs that could be life-changing for people living with T1D. We’re excited to follow the careers of our 7 Fellows and will share updates from their fascinating projects as they unfold.
