Study at CHRC
The Child Health Research Centre is keen to take on enthusiastic postgraduate students for honours, masters, and doctoral studies. We provide opportunities for graduates to develop a variety of skill sets for their future careers and support eligible students with travel to present research at international conferences.
Expressions of interest
Students interested in undertaking postgraduate studies through the CHRC may submit an expression of interest by following these steps:
- Decide on your area of study interest via the research section, for information. Visit UQ Researchers to search for a supervisor, or experts in a particular field.
- Email UQ CHRC to outline your area of interets and attach your CV and academic record.
- One of our senior researchers will contact you as soon as possible to discuss your interest in more detail.
Available projects
Please see the table below for current available projects at UQ CHRC.
Chief Investigator | Project title | Project description | Preferred educational background |
Dr. Kelvin (Zewen) Tuong Ian Frazer Centre for Children’s Immunotherapy Research (IFCCIR) | Creating a novel early warning system for pediatric cancers. | A cancer diagnosis at any age is upsetting, but felt more harshly when the patient is a young child who has only started out in life. Compared to adult cancer patients, the window of opportunity to help child cancer patients is especially short. We need to create an early warning system for paediatric cancers. Specialized immune cells known as T-cells and B-cells use specific receptors to recognize tumour antigens and fight cancerous cells. My lab's vision is to harness these cells and their receptors to enable early cancer detection and disease monitoring. These specific adaptive immune receptors are essential for all aspects of the T- and B-cell’s life cycle, serving as natural ‘time-keepers’ of the immune response against cancer progression. We will create bespoke computational algorithms to explore the properties that define how effective these immune cells are in childhood cancer, perform high resolution gene expression profiling at the single-cell level and develop highly advanced computer models that can be used to detect adaptive immune receptors that are targeted towards cancer. The projects will be largely dry-lab based and the candidates should expect to be working as part of a team together with leading groups in Australia as well as international collaborative networks (Cambridge, Sanger, UK). Available Honours/PhD projects
The projects will suit either an immunologist wanting to learn bioinformatics and/or a computer scientist who wants to apply their skills onto biological problems. MD students/clinicians who are keen to learn programming are also welcomed to apply. | An ideal candidate would have a background in immunology, computer science, and/or bioinformatics. Basic understanding of statistical methods and machine learning experience working with python/R is highly desirable. |
Professor Karen Barlow Acquired Brain Injury in Children (ABiC) | Health Service utilisation after childhood acquired brain injury | This study is investigating what health care services are used by families with a child who has had an acquired brain injury (ABI) in Queensland. This will help us identify gaps in care and the cost associated with ABI, which could help the government and supporting agencies plan for the future. Data collection has now been completed and provisional analysis taken place. This new honours project will work with ABiC and Health Service Research Unit at UQ to explore the cost of illness due to ABI in children in QLD. | |
Professor Karen Barlow Acquired Brain Injury in Children (ABiC) | Assessment of brain connectivity after acquired brain injury (ABI) | Traumatic brain injury results in axonal and white matter tract injury. After a brain injury, the communication between different regions of the brain (often called brain connectivity) can either slow down or fail. Brain connectivity is a measure of brain activity that assesses the strength of communication arising from brain regions in specific functional areas. The analysis of brain connectivity allows us to more accurately predict brain function following injury and monitor change during recovery and rehabilitation. The study investigates connectivity in children, adolescents and young adults recovering from ABI and includes participants without brain injuries to provide a suitable comparison. This honors project will focus on the use of fNIRS and EEG to understand the relationships between attention and cognition following brain injury in children. | |
Professor Karen Barlow Acquired Brain Injury in Children (ABiC) | Health Care Utilisation after Childhood Acquired Brain Injury in Queensland | Children with an Acquired Brain Injury(ABI) are at a high risk of abnormal weight gain or weight loss. Our understanding of why this is so is very limited. Unfortunately, abnormal weight has significant long term risks and can impair recovery from the injury. One piece of the puzzle is to understand the parent’s perspective and their understanding of what influences their child’s eating behaviours and growth. This study will ask these vital questions to parents of children with ABI. It will form a vital role of co-designing a new management strategy to ensure optimal growth in children. The student will be part of a qualitative study of 20-30 children/adolescents and families/caregivers,. The student will receive training on how to conduct qualitative consumer interviews. Your work on this will be instrumental to the co-design of an interdisciplinary health care model. All Ethics and Governance approvals are in place and is ready to commence in 2023. | |
Peter Sly, p.sly@uq.edu.au; Tamara Blake, t.blake@uq.edu.au Children's Health and Environment Program (CHEP) | Early origins of lung disease in cystic fibrosis: assessing lung function in infants | Increasing evidence suggests that irreversible, progressive lung disease begins in the very early years of life for patients with cystic fibrosis (CF). A significant limitation to early disease detection is the lack of feasible and sensitive measures available for use in very young patients. We aim to close this knowledge gap by using a new, innovative lung function technique that can easily and reliably measure lung function in very young children (<2 years of age). This project will involve participant recruitment and performing of lung function measurements on young children. A valid Blue Card is required. | A working knowledge of the respiratory system anatomy and physiology, respiratory related diseases (specifically cystic fibrosis) and lung function testing would be of benefit to someone working on this project. Experience in working with children is desirable but not mandatory. A basic understanding of statistical methods is also desirable. Ability to obtain a “working with children” certificate is mandatory. |
Peter Sly, p.sly@uq.edu.au; Tamara Blake, t.blake@uq.edu.au Children's Health and Environment Program (CHEP) | Early origins of lung disease in cystic fibrosis: Assessing lung structure with MRI | Despite great advances in clinical care and survival rates in cystic fibrosis (CF), patients continue to suffer a decline in lung function that starts in mid-childhood and progresses throughout life. We are seeking a PhD student to work with our collaborators at CSIRO to aid in the development, optimization and validation of a safe magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) protocol and automated diagnostic tool for CF lung disease assessment. The successful candidate will assist it identifying and labelling key anatomical features and help to link image findings to CF disease characteristics and mechanisms i.e. bronchiectasis, mucus plugging. Analysis of images will be performed using a modified version of the PRAGMA-CF score developed for reporting early CF lung disease on chest CT scans. | Our ideal candidate will have knowledge of cystic fibrosis (particularly respiratory symptoms and treatment), knowledge of respiratory system anatomy and physiology, an interest in imaging modalities, a willingness to work as part of a multi-disciplinary collaborative team and maintain active collaborations with other labs and universities. A background in mathematics would be helpful and basic understanding of statistical methods is also desirable. |
Dwan Vilcins, d.vilcins@uq.edu.au Children's Health and Environment Program (CHEP) | Maternal exposure to phthalates and allergic disease in children | There is an increasing body of evidence showing an association between plasticisers and allergic disease. Exposure to phthalates during pregnancy has been associated with increased risk of allergic diseases in resulting offspring. This study seeks to explore the association between phthalates and BPA measured in maternal urine during pregnancy, and the risk of allergic disease in children up to 4 years of age. Mediating factors will be explored, to test for potential casual mechanisms. Most notably the role of oxidative stress and genetic predisposition to oxidative stress will be explored as a potential modifying variable. This study will use a longitudinal cohort of children in Australia. | This project will suit a student with a background in statistics, epidemiology, or public health. Experience working with cohort data and R is highly desirable. |
Dr Mohammad Zahirul Islam, Mohammad.islam1@uq.edu.au Children's Health and Environment Program (CHEP) | Installation of green corner/wall: Reducing particulate matter and improving children’s lung function suffering from Asthma | Air pollution contains harmful substances such as particulate matter (PM). PM10 and PM2.5 has significant effects on childhood asthma exacerbation. Asthma is a chronic allergic respiratory disease involving both genetic and environmental factors. Early life exposure to air pollution contributes to the development of asthma by impacting the developing lung and immune system. Prenatal exposure to air pollution has been shown to increase the risk of wheezing and asthma development in children. The burden of asthma, bronchitis, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, cancers, cardiovascular diseases and subsequent morbidity and mortality is rising in the urban areas along with the ever-increasing rate of air pollution. It is estimated that more than 339 million people worldwide were affected by asthma. Many studies conducted worldwide addressed the relationship between PM exposure and asthma in terms of long-term effects but less is known as practical, easy and cost effective sustainable solution. Reducing overall levels of air pollution by taking initiatives to decrease exposure and minimizing one’s personal exposure to air pollution could reduce the risk of developing asthma in children. Thus, the objective of this study is to explore the effectiveness of the green corner/wall to reduce childhood asthma. This project will involve recruiting participants from the hospital and retrospectively identify their home. Set up a green corner or wall in the home could have the potential to filter the small particulate matter and thus make the air clean and reduce the asthma. The successful candidate will have knowledge on respiratory health and or environmental health. A basic knowledge of statistical methods is desirable. | Respiratory health and or environmental health background. A basic knowledge of statistical methods is desirable. |
Dr Abdullah Tarique, a.tarique@uq.edu.au Children's Health and Environment Program (CHEP) | How innate immune system deals with bacterial infections in cystic fibrosis lung disease | (1) Improving bacteria killing ability of cystic fibrosis (CF) macrophages. Bacteria killing ability of CF macrophages are known to be defective to extracellular bacteria. There is limited knowledge that how CF macrophages fight against intracellular bacteria. M. abscessus (MABS), an intracellular organism, is increasingly found in the CF lungs. Using MABS as a model pathogen, we aim to investigate how CF macrophages are defective in killing and clearance of intracellular bacteria and whether MABS killing ability can be enhanced by treating CF macrophages with a range of potential therapeutic agents. Basic laboratory knowledge including cell culture, bacterial culture, real-time PCR, western blot would be helpful. (2) Finding ways to improve mitochondrial dysfunctions in CF. -Mitochondria play crucial roles in killing and clearance of intracellular pathogens. Defective mitochondrial responses to respiratory bacteria had previously been observed in CFTR-KO zebrafish model and epithelial cells. This project aims to -understand how CFTR mutation(s) downregulate mitochondrial responses in macrophages obtained from CF patients, test a number of potential therapeutic agents whether they could improve mitochondrial defence mechanism in CF macrophages. | The candidate should have biochemistry, medical science, molecular biology or microbiology background. A working knowledge of immunology, bioinformatics, microbiology and pathogen infection would be of benefit to someone working on this project. |
Prof. Roslyn Boyd, r.boyd@uq.edu.au Queensland Cerebral Palsy and Rehabilitation Research Centre (QCPRRC) | School Readiness outcomes of early neuroprotection/ neurorehabilitation for children at high risk of Cerebral Palsy | One fully-funded PhD research opportunity exists in the areas of educational and developmental psychology, clinical psychology and/or neuropsychology, focusing on the early childhood outcomes of children at high risk of Cerebral Palsy, based at the Queensland Cerebral Palsy Research Centre, at the Child Health Research Centre, The University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia. Potential candidates will have a strong interest in research in educational and developmental psychology, clinical psychology and/or neuropsychology along with a First-Class Honours Degree in Psychology/Psychological Sciences. The project focuses on assessing School Readiness outcomes in a large multisite cohort of children at high risk of Cerebral Palsy (n>400), including cognition, communication, behaviour, and the parent-child relationship. Children at high risk of CP and/or Diagnosed with CP who have participated in one of four RCT’s of early intervention (NHMRC REACH and GAME trials, the PACT RCT of Parenting and Acceptance and Commitment therapy and the MRFF funded Protect Me RCT of maternal melatonin) will be followed up at 4 to 5 years of age. Preference will be given to candidates who are either provisionally or fully registered with the Psychology Board of Australia. | Psychology, Physiotherapy |
Dr Joanne George, j.george2@uq.edu.au Queensland Cerebral Palsy and Rehabilitation Research Centre (QCPRRC) | PREBO-6 Prediction of Preterm Brain Outcomes at 6 years of age | Doctoral projects will be part of the larger NHMRC funded PREBO-6 prospective cohort study involving advanced neuroimaging and neurodevelopmental assessment of children born prematurely. Please click the following weblink to our recent publication describing the PREBO-6 study protocol: https://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/bmjopen/10/5/e036480.full.pdf Potential candidates will have a strong interest in clinical research in the field of paediatrics and particularly in neonatal and developmental medicine and neuroscience. The successful candidate will belong to a highly productive multidisciplinary research environment that has strong collaborations across Australia, India, New Zealand, and USA. Doctoral training from the highly ranked Faculty of Medicine at The University of Queensland will be an ideal opportunity for medical and non-medical graduates from related healthcare fields (e.g., health science, neuroscience, nursing, physiotherapy/physical therapy, psychology, and/or public health) who are planning for an academic and/or clinical research career. | health science, neuroscience, nursing, physiotherapy/physical therapy, psychology, and/or public health |
A/Prof. Leanne Sakzewski, l.sakzewski1@uq.edu.au Queensland Cerebral Palsy and Rehabilitation Research Centre (QCPRRC) | Active Strides: Intensive rehabilitation for children with moderate to severe cerebral palsy to improve gross motor function, habitual physical activity and participation in physically active leisure | This single-blind multi-site randomised controlled trial (RCT) will investigate whether school-age children with moderate to severe CP (Gross Motor Function Classification System GMFCS III and IV) who are randomised to an eight-week ACTIVE STRIDES-CP intervention, compared with care as usual (CAU), have improved gross motor function immediately post intervention. Secondary outcomes will be changes in Habitual Physical Activity ([HPA], less time spent sedentary, increased light and/or moderate to vigorous physical activity MVPA), cardiorespiratory fitness (Physiological Cost index HR/PCI), walking speed and distance, frequency/involvement of community participation, daily activities and mobility performance, attainment of gross motor goals, healthcare use and quality of life immediately post intervention and with retention of outcomes 6 months post baseline. Active Strides-CP comprises a package of rehabilitation of Functional Electrical Stimulation (FES) cycling, adapted cycling, partial body weight support treadmill training (PBWSTT), overground gait training and goal directed training with a total dose of direct therapy of 32 hours delivered over an eight-week period. Within this large multi-site trial, there will be scope to develop a research program around the following top areas: • Participant and intervention (e.g. dose and content) related factors associated with clinically significant improvements in gross motor function, habitual physical activity and participation in physically active leisure • Fidelity of delivery of a manualized ACTIVE-STRIDES CP program across multiple sites and organisations. • The relationship between capacity, participation, fitness and habitual physical activity in children with cerebral palsy. | occupational therapy, sports/physical education and science |
Mark Coulthard, Mark.Coulthard@health.qld.gov.au; Trent Woodruff, t.woodruff@uq.edu.au | The molecular and cellular basis of vascular leak in severe sepsis/systemic inflammatory syndrome | Animal model of sepsis/SIRS/ARDS; in vitro endothelial cell culture; clinical assessment in QCH PICU | Science; laboratory experience preferred |
Christel Middeldorp, c.middeldorp@uq.edu.au | What predicts outcomes of treatment in public Child and Youth Mental Health Services | In all public CYMHS, routine outcome measures are collected at start, during and at end of treatment. Together with data on diagnoses, service use, family background, this provides a wealth of data to explore the outcomes of the children and adolescents treated in the various CYMHS clinics: inpatient, day program, eating disorders or community clinics. It is also possible to zoom in on a particular diagnosis, such as ADHD or eating disorders, and investigate factors influencing outcomes for children with these disorders. | Medicine, Psychology, Bio-informatics, neuroscience |
Contact us at uqchrc@uq.edu.au for more information and to discuss project opportunities.
Apply
Before applying for a Higher Degree by Research with the Graduate School, you must have submitted and Expression of Interest first.
The University of Queensland has supported more than 15,000 students in their academic pursuit to attain a higher degree by research. With over 2,000 research experts and a reputation world-wide as an elite research institution, choosing to undertake a research higher degree at UQ will provide you with every advantage.
More than 4,000 students are currently undertaking a higher degree by research at UQ under the support and guidance of the UQ Graduate School. The Graduate School has academic responsibility for managing admissions, providing research scholarships, supporting students during their candidature, and facilitating the examination of theses. The Graduate School coordinates year-round skills training, supports infrastructure and research facilities, and provides opportunities to accelerate career development.