Josephine Forbes | |
---|---|
Nationality | Australian |
Alma mater | University of Melbourne |
Awards | Commonwealth Health Minister's Award Young Tall Poppy Award NHMRC Achievement Award |
Scientific career | |
Fields | Medicine Diabetes Nephrology |
Institutions | Mater Research |
Josephine Forbes (born 20 August 1970) is an Australian scientist specialising in the study of glycation and diabetes. She has been studying diabetes since 1999 and has worked at Royal Children's Hospital, University of Melbourne and Baker Heart and Diabetes Institute in Melbourne Australia. Since 2012 she has led the Glycation and Diabetes team at Mater Research which is a world-class medical research institute based at South Brisbane, and part of the Mater Group. Josephine is program leader for Mater's Chronic Disease Biology and Care theme, building greater understanding of the biological basis of a broad range of chronic diseases, and developing preventative strategies and innovative treatments to improve patient outcomes. Josephine and her team focus on how advanced glycation contributes to the pathogenesis of diabetes and its complications such as kidney disease. [1]
Professor Forbes currently leads a team of post-doctoral researchers and supervises numerous students, in addition to being a professor of medicine at the University of Queensland and a principal research fellow in the Department of Medicine at the University of Melbourne. [2]
Forbes was awarded her PhD in Nephrology in 1999 from the University of Melbourne, for research carried out at the Royal Children's Hospital. She is currently an NHMRC Senior Research Fellow and has held research grants from the NHMRC of Australia, the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation (JDRF) and the National Institutes of Health (USA). [1]
Forbes has received many awards in recognition of her research:
Forbes' research focuses on the process of advanced glycation and its contribution to diabetes and its complications, in particular kidney disease. Her recent work includes research into how advanced glycation of food by modern processing techniques and storage may be contributing to our diabetes epidemic. [2]
Her research aims to find medicines which reduce the accumulation of products of advanced glycation, which in turn will impact the incidence of diabetes and kidney disease. Her research also aims to provide information to food regulatory authorities and health care providers about advanced glycation in food and the implications of ingesting this in excess. [4]
So far this research has identified a class of medicines which appears to be effective for the treatment of kidney disease in diabetes, and also affects how our bodies process sugar. In the food area, she has conducted a clinical trial in overweight individuals examining the effects of advanced glycation products in food on their sugar handling and kidney function. Her team is also part of a large clinical trial tracking the consumption of advanced glycation products by mothers and their babies to see if there is an association with this and the development of Type 1 diabetes in later life. [4]
Her work to date has resulted in more than 100 publications with more than 4500 citations.
Nephrology is a specialty for both adult internal medicine and pediatric medicine that concerns the study of the kidneys, specifically normal kidney function and kidney disease, the preservation of kidney health, and the treatment of kidney disease, from diet and medication to renal replacement therapy. The word "renal" is an adjective meaning "relating to the kidneys", and its roots are French or late Latin. Whereas according to some opinions, "renal" and "nephro" should be replaced with "kidney" in scientific writings such as "kidney medicine" or "kidney replacement therapy", other experts have advocated preserving the use of renal and nephro as appropriate including in "nephrology" and "renal replacement therapy", respectively.
Hugh Redmond Brady is an Irish academic, the 17th President of Imperial College London, and a professor of medicine. He was the 13th President and Vice-Chancellor of the University of Bristol. He is also President Emeritus of University College, Dublin (UCD), having served as UCD's eighth President from 2004 to 2013.
Michael Cowley is an Australian physiologist. He is best known for his mapping of the neural circuits involved in metabolism and obesity and diabetes treatment. He is a professor in the Department of Physiology at Monash University in the Faculty of Biomedical and Psychological Sciences. He is also a director of the Australian diabetes drug development company, Verva Inc, and director of the Monash Obesity & Diabetes Institute] (modi).
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Sharon A. Anderson is an American physician, educator, and researcher practicing in Portland, Oregon. She has contributed extensively to the study of the progression of chronic kidney disease. Her research has focused on diabetic nephropathy, polycystic kidney disease and the pathophysiology of the aging kidney. She was the first woman to serve as President of the American Society of Nephrology (ASN). She was the Chief of the Department of Medicine at the Veteran's Affairs Medical Center in Portland and is currently the Chair of the Department of Medicine at Oregon Health and Science University (OHSU). She has been appointed to the National Institutes of Health Council of Councils. Her publications as author or co-author number greater than 150.
Vlado Perkovic is an Australian renal physician and researcher who is the Provost at the University of New South Wales, Sydney, having previously been Dean of Medicine & Health at that University between 2019 and 2023.
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Melissa Helen Little is an Australian scientist and academic who has served as director of Cell Biology at the Murdoch Children's Research Institute since 2019. She is also a Professor in the Faculty of Medicine, Dentistry and Health Sciences, University of Melbourne, and Program Leader of Stem Cells Australia. In January 2022, she became CEO of the Novo Nordisk Foundation Center for Stem Cell Medicine reNEW, an international stem cell research center based at University of Copenhagen, and a collaboration between the University of Copenhagen, Denmark, Murdoch Children’s Research Institute, Australia, and Leiden University Medical Center, The Netherlands.
Judith Ann Whitworth is an Australian medical researcher in the areas of kidney function and blood pressure. Now an emeritus professor, she is the former director of the John Curtin School of Medical Research and Howard Florey Professor of Medical Research at the Australian National University (ANU).
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Professor Wendy Elizabeth Hoy AO is a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Science (FAA), the Director of the Centre for Chronic Disease at the University of Queensland, Australia, and was appointed an Officer of the Order of Australia (AO) in 2010 and elected as a member of the Australian Academy of Science in 2015. Hoy's research has involved developing new types of kidney imaging and improving health and lives for indigenous populations, in Australia, Sri Lanka and the USA.
Louise Maple-Brown is an Australian endocrinologist. She is a clinical researcher at the Royal Darwin Hospital, serving as the hospital's Head of Endocrinology and as NHMRC Practitioner Fellow with the Menzies School of Health Research at Charles Darwin University. She leads a clinical research program within the Wellbeing and Preventable Chronic Diseases division of Menzies with a focus on diabetes in Indigenous Australians and provides clinical diabetes services to urban and remote Northern Territory communities.
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Carol Pollock is an Australian medical researcher specialising in kidney health and disease. She is a Clinical Professor of Medicine at the University of Sydney, Northern Clinical School, Kolling Institute of Medical Research. Her research interests also include obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, healthy ageing and lifespan, employing animal models and cellular and molecular techniques. She is the Chair of Kidney Health Australia and was the Chair of Medicine Royal North Shore Hospital in 2011 to 2016.