Each year, a number of talented researchers at St Vincent’s AMR and St Vincent’s Hospital are selected for AMR’s Translational Research Grants.
Congratulations to 2026 recipients:
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- Dr Audrey Adji
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- Dr David Darley
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- Meredith Rogers
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- Dr Michael Lovelace
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- Dr Wei Jiang
These grants will go on to support essential research equipment, protected research time for clinicians, and much more.
About the Grant Recipients
Dr Audrey Adji
Dr. Audrey Adji is a research fellow at St Vincent’s Centre for Applied Medical Research, and a research scientist at the Victor Chang Cardiac Research Institute. Her research focuses on pulsatile function in cardiovascular diseases, including mechanical circulatory support devices for heart failure and the ill-effects of excessive pulsatile load on brain circulation. She has authored over 100 peer-reviewed publications, participated in and invited to speak at national and international conferences, and contributed to collaborative research networks. Dr. Adji has been recognised with scientific awards and serves on editorial boards of hypertension journals. As Chair of the Women in Hypertension (Research) Committee at Hypertension Australia and the Early Career Research Network of Pulse of Asia, she supports early-career and female researchers. She is a Fellow of both the International Society of Hypertension and the Cardiac Society of Australia and New Zealand.
Dr David Darley
Dr David R Darley, MBBS BSc (Hons) FRACP PhD is a Staff Specialist in Lung Transplantation, Respiratory and Sleep Medicine at St Vincent’s Hospital Darlinghurst. He was awarded a St Vincent’s Clinic Foundation Scholarship to complete a Fellowship at the University of Toronto, Canada, in Advanced Lung Diseases and Lung Transplantation in 2017-2018. David completed his doctoral thesis in 2024 at UNSW in which he identified novel pathophysiologic markers of lung allograft dysfunction phenotypes after transplantation. David’s H-Index is 18 with 3385 citations. David leads the investigator-initiated research program in Lung Transplantation at St Vincent’s Sydney and is a Senior Conjoint Lecturer at the St Vincent’s Clinical School UNSW.
Meredith Rogers
Meredith Rogers is a senior hand therapist and occupational therapist at St Vincent’s Public Hospital. She has twenty years of experience working in NSW public hospitals primarily in the clinical area of hand therapy. She is an Accredited Hand Therapist as awarded by the Australian Hand Therapy Association and holds the Certified Hand Therapist credential (USA).
Meredith is a passionate advocate for the significant role that highly skilled public hospital hand therapists play both in assisting their patients and in contributing to the broader healthcare system. Her Masters programme of research (Australian Catholic University) focuses on the value of public hospital hand therapy services. Her first research article is currently under peer review.
Dr Michael Lovelace
Dr Michael Lovelace is a Senior Scientist at the St Vincent’s Centre for Applied Medical Research, working in the laboratory of Prof Bruce Brew. His research focuses on the effects of inflammation on brain and neural stem cells through activation of the Kynurenine pathway of amino acid tryptophan metabolism.
Dr Lovelace manages the St Vincent’s Centre for Applied Medical Research Live Imaging Facility (LIF), a core facility supporting flow cytometry and advanced microscopy for over 20 active users. He has secured more than $1 million in competitive grant funding, including equipment grants that have expanded the LIF’s capabilities. His work has been recognised internationally, winning the 2019 Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology (ARVO, USA) Scientific Image Contest, the 2013 NHMRC Science to Art Award, and being named a Top 10 finalist and Highly Commended in the Australian Museum New Scientist Eureka Prize for Science Photography.
Dr Wei Jiang
Dr Wei Jiang is a clinical and laboratory haematologist with dual fellowships from the Royal Australasian College of Physicians and the Royal College of Pathologists Australasia. She graduated with a combined Bachelor of Arts/Bachelor of Science/Bachelor of Medicine from the University of New South Wales in 2008. She completed physician’s training at Royal Prince Alfred Hospital, and then haematology specialist training at St Vincent’s, St George and Wollongong Hospitals. In 2018, Dr Jiang was awarded a Leukaemia Foundation/Haematology Society of Australia and New Zealand New Investigator scholarship to undertake a PhD in cellular therapies at the Westmead Institute for Medical research. She has been subsequently awarded the prestigious Rebecca Gumley Leukaemia Foundation Fellowship to continue her research work into pathogen and tumour-specific T cells. Her research work has resulted in a number of publications in high impact journals, and presentations at national and international conferences. Her work was awarded the highest scoring abstract at the International Society of Cellular Therapies Australia/New Zealand conference in 2019, and she was a finalist for the Baikie award for outstanding original research in 2020. She continues to be involved as a research lead in a number of investigator-led T cell therapy trials, including most recently as a chief investigator in a Medical Research Futures Fund Early Career Researcher grant-supported clinical trial awarded in 2025.
Dr Jiang has a keen interest in malignant haematology, haemopoietic stem cell transplantation and cellular therapies. Her research interests are in immune reconstitution and exploration of how the immune system may be modified to treat and prevent relapse of haematological cancers and autoimmune diseases.