Increase Australias capacity for outstanding health and medical research at the highest competitive level internationally

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This Fellowship aims to increase Australia’s capacity for outstanding health and medical research at the highest competitive level internationally by utilising to their full potential the strategically planned population-based research resources I have already established. We have established state of the art protocols for collecting family data, and following up large cohorts of families. We are now in a superb position to rapidly translate genetic findings (ours and others) into clinical and public health programs and evaluate their impacts. This Fellowship should encourage high calibre Australian researchers to continue their work in Australia. It will give the resources in terms of people and research funds to develop to its full potential the population resource that I have built up over the last two decades. Funding will strengthen the position of Australian family and twin study resources within the international network so as to further enhance collaborations, knowledge transfer, and permit us to continue to demonstrate leadership. Continued funding of key personnel and the opportunity to recruit the best new talent through offering attractive positions, and funding to conduct our own genetic and molecular analyses rather than handing the material over to others, are essential for us to maintain and enhance the reputation in the highly competitive areas of cancer genetics. That is, we intend to demonstrate that Australia is the leader in the new discipline of MEGA Epidemiology. A major aim of this Fellowship is to use our research findings to “make a difference” to the health and well-being of Australians. This will be achieved by continuing to widen our perspective to include qualitative research techniques in trying to find out what are the issues impacting on the public – and the clinicians and bureaucrats – in decision making around the possibilities and risks being raised by new genetic findings.