Chief Investigators​
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Professor Andrea O'Connor
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Professor Andrea O’Connor, BE(Hons), PhD, FIChemE is the Shanahan Chair in Frontier Medical Solution and leads the Tissue Engineering Group at the University of Melbourne. She was formerly the Head of the Department of Biomedical Engineering at the University of Melbourne. She was a Fulbright Scholar at Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1995-96. Her research is focussed on design, synthesis and fabrication of biomaterials, porous materials and antimicrobial nanomaterials. She is particularly interested in strategies for scale-up of tissue engineering including vascularisation, and design of antimicrobial materials for medical implants. She has published over 80 journal articles, co-authored the chapter on Tissue Engineering for the major reference work ‘Plastic Surgery’ edited by Neligan and Gurtner, lectured on tissue engineering and biofabrication at the Bayreuth International Summer School, Germany, and was a finalist in the 2017 Graeme Clark Institute HealthTech Innovation Challenge. Andrea also led the engineering team on the world-first Neopec clinical trial of breast reconstruction using tissue engineering, showing proof-of-principle of tissue engineering of large volumes of well vascularised fat tissue. She collaborates with a range of hospitals, medical research institutes and medical device companies to improve existing products, develop new devices and solve clinical problems.
Professor Graham Shaffer
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Graham Schaffer is Professor of Materials and Design in the Melbourne School of Engineering at the University of Melbourne. He was previously Executive Dean for Engineering, Architecture and IT at The University of Queensland, Pro Vice-Chancellor for Science, Health and Engineering at La Trobe University and Dean of the Melbourne School of Engineering.
The alloys he has designed are in service in automotive engines and the nanomaterials processing methods he has pioneered are used to produce the active ingredient in commercial sunscreens. He has more than 200 publications with 5 patents and 150 refereed journal papers.
Professor Schaffer has BSc and MSc degrees from the University of Cape Town and a PhD from the University of Birmingham. He is a Chartered Professional Engineer and a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering, the Institution of Engineers Australia and the American Powder Metallurgy Institute International.
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Professor George Franks
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George Franks is Professor in Chemical Engineering at the University of Melbourne. He completed his undergraduate degree in Materials Science and Engineering at MIT in 1985. He worked for seven years in the ceramics industry. He completed his PhD in Materials in 1997 at UCSB then moved to Australia. His research includes suspension rheology, ceramic powder processing, materials modelling and minerals processing. His work in materials manufacturing relates to ceramic powder processing for low cost production of near net shape ceramic components. His work is primarily related to processing of complex shaped ceramics and composites with unique microstructures such as multi-scale porous ceramics. Recently 3D printing of ceramics has been a focus. Biomedical implants are a potential application space for such ceramics. Research in defence applications includes ultra-high temperature ceramics for aerospace applications and light weight ceramic armour. His research includes composite materials microstructure–properties modelling and atomic scale ab-initio modelling. His work in minerals processing relates to development and application of novel polymeric reagents in solid/liquid separation and froth flotation. He is a member of the Particulate Fluids Processing Centre and the Defence Materials Technology Centre. He has 120 papers in international peer reviewed journals, 6 book chapters and four patents with 3700 citations and h-index = 32. He is Associate Editor of the Journal of the American Ceramic Society and Editor of Advanced Powder Technology.
To learn more about Professor Frank's research please visit: http://www.chemical.eng.unimelb.edu.au/ceramics/
Dr Tegan Cheng
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Dr Tegan Cheng is a Biomedical Engineer and Scientist at the EPIC Lab, Sydney Children's Hospital at Westmead. Dr Cheng works with clinicians to develop solutions to address unmet needs in paediatrics. Her research areas are the development of medical devices for musculoskeletal conditions and the application of 3D printing to improve health outcomes for children.
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Dr David John Saxby
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Dr David John Saxby graduated with a PhD in Computational Biomechanics from Griffith University in 2016. Since then, he has endeavored to build a research program nationally and internationally known for excellence, innovation, and forward thinking in biomedical engineering. A central theme across a range of active research projects is the development of high-fidelity representations of the human neuromusculoskeletal system, known colloquially as "Digital Twins". These digital twins enable researchers to conduct powerful physics-based simulations of human motor function, and model the interaction with medical devices, and bring assertive technology under robust control. In application, digital twins may become digital patients to address clinical problems, whereby these same physics-based models assist physicians to plan surgery and understand consequences of surgical design choices, and also to tailor rehabilitation programming to be personalized to the patient. Dr Saxby is honored and enthused to be part of the ARC CMIT program, and aims to make an impact in education and research for the next generation of biomedical engineers.
A/Prof Egon Perilli
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PhD Bioengineering (2006), MSc Physics (2001), University of Bologna, Italy.
Associate Professor in Biomedical Engineering, Medical Device Research Institute, Flinders University; Affiliate Lecturer, School of Medical Sciences, The University of Adelaide; Honorary Fellow, Dept. of Medicine, Austin Health, The University of Melbourne. Between 2008-2011: Senior Research Fellow, Bone & Joint Research Lab, Surgical Pathology, SA Pathology, Adelaide.
A/Prof Egon Perilli developed his scientific research background in Europe:
- 2007-2008: Post-Doctoral Researcher at company SkyScan, Kontich, Belgium (micro-CT manufacturer, now Bruker micro-CT), in collaboration with Visionlab, Dept. of Physics, University of Antwerp, Belgium.
- Between 2002-2007: Scientific Researcher at Medical Technology Laboratory, Istituto Ortopedico Rizzoli, Bologna, Italy, carrying out his PhD research on micro-CT imaging and mechanical testing of bone.
His research involves several biomedical imaging techniques, in particular state of the art micro-CT, both in vitro and in vivo, of bone and joints and biomaterials, on human tissue and animal models, combined with biomechanical testing. Application of Digital volume correlation (DVC) enables to compute displacements and strains, to validate finite element predictions.
He is a supervisor and instrument leader of the large-volume micro-CT imaging laboratory in Flinders which was launched in 2020, thanks to the successful ARC LIEF grant for which he is lead CI. He is the current President (2018-2021) of the Australian & New Zealand Orthopaedic Research Society (ANZORS) and was the ANZORS Society Secretary from 2015-2018. He has been board member of the International Federation of Musculoskeletal Research Societies (IFMRS) since 2018. He holds collaborative projects with national and international groups (Australia, UK, Netherlands, Italy), is a board member of scientific journals, gives consultancies to universities and private institutions, in Australia and Europe and he is an assessor for over 10 funding bodies including the ARC, NHMRC, Wellcome Trust (UK).
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A/Prof Chris Carty
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