Message from the Head of School
Kia ora koutou
Well, it has been a roller-coaster 6 months so I thank you all for your patience. It started on day 1 with a very strong signal from the Faculty that the School tighten its belt and that has pretty much consumed most of the last 6 months of my life.
Despite the bleak times across the wider University sector, I want to recognise the fact that the School continues to be a huge and overall successful unit.
Researchers in SMS submitted 549 research proposals, with successes below:
| Funding Source | Total |
| AMRF – PostDoc, Doctoral, Travel, Project and individual grant | 24 |
| CRTNZ – Professional development, Special purpose, Project grant, PostDoc | 6 |
| HRC (Project, Health Delivery, Emerging Leader, CDA) | 11 |
| NHF (Travel, Fellowship, Project, Small Project) | 13 |
| Neurological Foundation (Project, Small Project, Postdoc, Summer Studentship, scholarships) | 22 |
| RSNZ (Catalyst, Marsden) | 4 |
| MBIE (Te Titoki, MBIE programme) | 2 |
| MPPT (Conference, travel. Project) | 27 |
| ABI MedTech, MWC, HVN | 31 |
| Centres (Te Aka, Healthy Hearts) | 14 |
| U2, Global Research engagement | 3 |
| Breast Cancer Foundation | 2 |
| M&HSF , SOMF (RDF, Donor) | 49 |
| Other (Domestic – ESR, Dignity Health, Sclerosis research, NZIMRT CureKids, Abiomed) | 12 |
| International (NIH, Massachusetts Hospital, SDHB, Cystinosis Ireland) | 5 |
The School has 215 PhD students enrolled. In 2024 there were 26 MBiomedSc, 6 MSc Pharmacology, 1 MSc Physiology, 26 BBiomedSc Hons and 2 BSc Hons Pharmacology completions. At undergraduate and post-graduate taught courses, we had 1080 EFTs across BSc, Dietetics, Medical Imaging, MBChB, Pharmacy and Nursing programmes, undoubtedly making us the most diverse School in terms of teaching portfolio.
To recognise this, the School now has Srdjan Vlajkovic looking after PhD portfolio, Debbie Young looking after sub-doctoral students and David Musson looking after student affairs.
Congratulations to our new Professor Simon Swift and new Associate Professors Jacqui Hannam and Julie Spicer.
There will be lots of changes to the leadership team across the School in 2025. Sue McGlashan, who seems to have been a permanent fixture on SMS Executive as Post Graduate Director and then Academic Director for the last 6 months (and acting, acting HoS in my absence), will finish on 31 January 2025. Clare Wall will be taking over as HoS on 1 February, Andrea Braakhuis has been confirmed as HoD Nutrition and Dietetics and Bronwen Connor will be HoD Pharmacology from 1 January, Justin Dean will be HoD Physiology from 1 February and Cherie Blenkiron will be HoD MMP from 1 April.
There are many people for me to thank, including Sue, all the Heads of Departments, as well as Bruce and his team, Niki and Helen (HR), and Sneha (finance), who are working away trying to deal with my very frequent visits. As always, a special shout out to the tutors who allow me to be distracted from my teaching commitments to take on these roles.
Make sure that you have a good break, so book your annual leave and take it. And don’t forget to submit any outstanding research reports to Maha and her team before you go.
Nga mihi
Malcolm
PhD success
Congratulations to John Ho, Department of Pharmacology for successfully defending his PhD thesis.
Staff success
Professor Mike Dragunow, Department of Pharmacology and CBR is a renowned neuropharmacologist who has been honoured with both the 2024 Hercus Medal by the Royal Society and the 2024 Marsden Medal by the New Zealand Association of Scientists.
PhD Students success
Congratulations to Joshua Chang and Audrys Pauza, Department of Physiology for their successes at the recent Australasian Society for Autonomic Neuroscience (ASAN) meeting in Sydney.
Staff success
Please join me in congratulating Dr Michael Plunkett who was awarded a prize for his talk on ‘Autonomic reflex drivers of exercise limitation in pulmonary arterial hypertension’ at the 2024 Heart Lung Foundation (formerly GLREF) Scientific Session.
New staff
The Medical Imaging team is pleased to welcome Dr Ellen Woodcock, who is joining the team as a Professional Teaching Fellow in the PGDipHSc [Cardiac Ultrasound] Programme.
New PhD student
The Medical Imaging team is excited to welcome PhD student, Jiangfan Yu.
Sir Peter Gluckman research medal
Professor Julian Paton from the Department of Physiology is the 2024 recipient of the Sir Peter Gluckman Medal.
Partridge Laureates Family Foundation
Professor Julian Paton from the Department of Physiology, together with Dr Amanda Dixon McIver from IGENZ, Auckland, recently became the inaugural Partridge Laureates.
High impact papers
Associate Professor Samantha Holdsworth, Associate Professor Miriam Scadeng (HoD) and Dr Daniel Cornfeld (Honorary Fellow) from the Department of Anatomy and Medical Imaging were involved in a study that explores a specialised MRI technique.