October 21, 2019

Professor Jennifer L. Martin announced as 2020 Leach Lecturer

UOW Deputy Vice-Chancellor to deliver prestigious protein science lecture

Organisers of the internationally renowned Lorne Conference on Protein Structure and Function have announced that University of Wollongong Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research & Innovation) Professor Jennifer L. Martin AC will deliver the prestigious Leach Lecture at next year’s event.

Held annually in Lorne, Victoria, the internationally regarded conference draws leading protein science researchers from around the world.

The program for the 2020 Lorne Conference (9 – 13 February 2020) includes speakers from some of the world’s top research institutions, including Oxford University and Cambridge University in the UK, Columbia University and the Harvard Medical School in the USA, and Germany’s Max Planck Institute. 

The Leach Lecture is a highlight of each year’s conference and recognises scientists who have made an exceptional contribution to protein science, including their role as advocates for the discipline.

The lecture is named in honour of Syd Leach who was the driving force behind the founding of the Lorne Conference on Protein Structure and Function in 1976

Professor Martin said it was a great honour to be invited to present the Leach Lecture.

“I am absolutely thrilled, delighted and honoured to be asked to be the Leach Lecturer. Just being invited to speak at the Lorne Conference is a huge honour; being given the opportunity to deliver a Leach Lecture is simply incredible to me,” Professor Martin said.

Professor Martin is known internationally for her pioneering research in protein crystallography, a branch of structural biology that seeks to understand how biological machines operate. She studies disease-causing proteins, in order to design new drugs to combat them.

A major aspect of her research focuses on the growing problem of antibiotic-resistant infections and finding new approaches to overcoming them.

In 2018, Professor Martin was awarded the highest civilian honour in Australia, Companion (AC) in the General Division of the Order of Australia, “for eminent service to science, and to scientific research, particularly in the field of biochemistry and protein crystallography applied to drug-resistant bacteria, as a role model, and as an advocate for gender equality in science”.

Professor Martin is President of the Asian Crystallograpic Association and a member of the Executive for the International Union of Crystallography (IUCr). She was elected Fellow of the Australian Academy of Science in 2017.

She was a founding member of the Science in Australia Gender Equity (SAGE) Steering Committee, which established the Athena SWAN pilot to address gender equity in science, technology, engineering, maths and medicine.

Professor Martin was also a member of the NHMRC Women in Health Sciences Committee, and currently Chairs the IUCr Gender Equity and Diversity Committee.