Founder and President:
Prof. Susan L. Prescott, University of Western Australia Susan Prescott is a Professor of Paediatrics in the School of Medicine at University of Western Australia. She is a Paediatrician and an Immunologist, specialising in Allergy at the Perth Children’s Hospital. Susan is a Founding Director of the ORIGINS Project at the Telethon KIDS Institute, a legacy project examining how the environment influences health throughout life. Her interests and expertise are focused around early life risk factors for inflammation as an antecedent (and preventive target) for a broad range of noncommunicable diseases (NCD), with a particular interest in early onset NCDs such as allergy, obesity and mental health. She works at the highest international level of her field, and is a former Director of the World Allergy Organisation. She is also founding President of the multidisciplinary ‘DOHaD’ Society in Australia and New Zealand (Developmental Origins of Health and Disease). She founded and continues to chair inVIVO Planetary Health an interdisciplinary research network with over 450 members from more than 50 partner institutions. She has over 300 scientific publications, and is also author of several books: The Allergy Epidemic – a Mystery of Modern Life (published for an international public audience), The Calling, and Origins - Early Life Solutions to the Modern Health Crisis, and most recently The Secret Life of Your Microbiome: Why Nature and Biodiversity are Essential to Health and Happiness. Susan cares deeply about the social determinants of health, and takes a holistic approach to life. Her inspiration to study medicine came from her grandmother, one of the few women to study medicine in the 1930s, and her love of research and academia was inspired by her grandfather Sir Stanley Prescott, former Vice-Chancellor of The University of Western Australia.
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Vice President and Secretary:
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Honorary Fellows
inVIVO Planetary Health recognizes our Honorary Fellows for their inspirational vision, community leadership, academic contributions to our field and their support of our Network in various ways.
Professor John Hearn Executive Director, Worldwide Universities Network, Professor of Reproductive Physiology in the School of Medical Sciences at the University of Sydney; Chairman of the Australia Africa Universities Network.
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Prof Hearn has been a key champion of inVIVO since its inception, as part of the Worldwide Universities Network (WUN) Public Health initiative. He is a reproductive and developmental physiologist, with 220 research publications and six edited books in human and animal fertility, stem cell biology and biotechnology, his research now is on the science and ethics of stem cell and regenerative medicine, and on reform in international higher education. He was Vice President of the University of Sydney 2004-13; Vice President of the Australian National University (2001-4); and Director, ANU Research School of Biological Sciences (1998-2001). He holds the Scientific Medal of the Zoological Society of London; the Osman-Hill medal of the Primate Society of Great Britain; and the Australian Centenary Medal “for outstanding service to science and to the Australian Government as a scientific adviser”. Born in India, raised in England and Kenya, he graduated BSc, MSc and DSc from University College Dublin; and PhD from the Australian National University (ANU). He served as a researcher, educator and director of national and international programs at the Universities of Edinburgh, London UCL, Wisconsin-Madison, the ANU and Sydney; and as a Senior Scientific Adviser to the World Health Organisation and the World Wildlife Fund. In conjunction with these appointments, he was Director of Science of the Zoological Society of London 1980-87; Deputy Secretary of the Agricultural and Food Research Council of the UK 1987-90; and Director of the Wisconsin National Primate Research Centre 1990-96. He was elected President of the International Primatological Society (1984-8) and of the Society for Reproductive Biology (2001-4). A committed international citizen, he directed research and capacity development programs in Kenya, Brazil, China, Thailand and India.
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Prof Tari Haahtela,
Professor Emeritus University of Helsinki. |
Prof Haahtela has been a long-time proponent of the Biodiversity Hypothesis - which suggests that contact with natural environments enriches the human microbiome, promotes immune balance and protects from inflammatory diseases. He has been a key advocate for the impact of biodiversity loss and climate change secondary to human activities on human health effects through the loss on environmental and commensal microbiotas. He is the former Head of Skin and Allergy Hospital, Helsinki University Hospital and Chair of the Finnish Asthma Programme 1994-2004. Following the paradigm shift recognizing asthma as an inflammatory condition 1980s, this was the first national program to implement first-line treatment with anti-inflammatory medication. This breakthrough program markedly improved care and and cut health costs for individuals and society. Since the early 2000s his group have been exploring the underlying reasons for the “allergy epidemic” by comparing the Finnish and Russian Karelia to identify the critical environmental and lifestyle determinants. This culminated in the Biodiversity Hypothesis. These novel ideas have been implemented in the Finnish Allergy Programme 2008-2018 which he also chairs. This paradigm is relevant to healthcare and society as a whole, underscoring the importance of natural environments for immune health and noncommunicable disease prevention in general. He has been a Board Member of European Academy of Allergology and Clinical Immunology (EAACI), Global Initiative for Asthma (GINA) and World Allergy Organization (WAO). He was Honorary President of the EAACI Helsinki Meeting 2017. He has published guidebooks on butterflies, which are his hobby. Always ‘thinking outside the box’, Tari linked his hobby and his clinical interest in his publication Allergy is rare where butterflies flourish in a biodiverse environment contributing further to the Biodiversity Hypothesis. He is greatly admired by many in the inVIVO network, as much for his expansive philosophies and forward thinking as for his major contributions to science, health and the community at large.
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Prof Stephen Holgate, MRC Professor of Immunopharmacology, University of Southampton.
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Prof Holgate is internationally recognised for his research on the mechanisms of asthma and allergy, with a particular interest in the toxicology of air pollutants and the roles of viruses and allergens as drivers of airway inflammation and remodelling. His work has resulted in over 1000 peer reviewed publications and an h index of 155. He has been President of the British Society for Allergy and Clinical Immunology, the British Thoracic Society, the British Association for Lung Research and the Collegium Internationale Allergologicum. He has been Chair of MRC Population and Systems Medicine Board and the MRC Translational Research Group. He is a Trustee of the British Lung Foundation, Cancer Research UK and the Kennedy Trust and chairs the Research Assessment Panel and Research Strategy Committee of the Great Ormond Street Hospital Children’s Charity. In 2003, he cofounded Synairgen, a drug discovery company for respiratory disease and was Founder Chair of the ERS Science Council. He has chaired the UK Government Committee on the Medical Effects of Air Pollutants, the Expert Panel on Air Quality Standards, and the Hazardous Substances Advisory Committee, prior to which he was a member of the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution. He was a Founder Member of the Academy of Medical Sciences, served on its Council and founded the Clinical and Veterinary Section of the Academia Europaea. In 2011 Stephen was awarded CBE by the Queen in recognition of his contributions to clinical science. His wisdom, experience and philosophies around the values for successful networks have been core values of inVIVO since its inception.
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