Senior Clinician Researchers

Dr Tey’s areas of research are bone marrow transplantation and cellular immunotherapy. Her research in bone marrow transplantation is focused on understanding the interplay between anti-tumour immunity, viral infection and graft-versus-host disease; and the means by which these can be modulated to improve patient outcome. She has a particular interest in developing novel cellular therapies in bone marrow transplantation and cancer treatment. Her group is currently strongly focused o the development of new Chimeric Antigen Receptor (CAR) T cell therapies that are safer and more efficacious. She has established a bench-to-bedside translational pipeline in collaboration with the Royal Brisbane and Women's Hospital that has the capacity to make clinical grade CAR T cells in-house for early phase clinical trials.

Professor Steven Lane is a clinical haematologist and devotes 30% of his time to seeing patients with leukaemia and related blood disorders at the Royal Brisbane and Women’s Hospital. Professor Lane is active in clinical trials including as principal investigator on prospective clinical trials in acute leukaemia and has accredited GCP training.

Associate Professor Bridget Barber is head of the Clinical Malaria Group at QIMR Berghofer, an Infectious Diseases Physician at Royal Brisbane and Women’s Hospital, and an NHMRC EL2 Fellow.

Associate Professor Barber completed her PhD in 2014 at Menzies School of Health Research with Professor Nicholas Anstey. For her PhD, she established a clinical research site in Sabah, Malaysia and led a large prospective study of the epidemiology, clinical and pathophysiological features of knowlesi, falciparum and vivax malaria. Following her PhD she was awarded an NHMRC Early Career Fellowship to continue her malaria research in Malaysia.

The outputs from her studies in Malaysia have made a major contribution to the current understanding of knowlesi malaria. This has included the first descriptions of the use of intravenous artesunate for the treatment of knowlesi malaria; the first systematic evaluations of microscopy and rapid diagnostic tests for the diagnosis of P. knowlesi; the first descriptions of knowlesi malaria in children and in pregnancy; and first detailed reports of pathogenesis of knowlesi malaria.

Dr Graham Radford-Smith is an Honorary Group Leader at QIMR Berghofer. In addition he is also the director of Integrated Gut Health (IGH), a new, holistic model of healthcare for gastroenterology and a Senior Staff Specialist at the Royal Brisbane and Women’s Hospital, with major clinical (Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD) Service) and administrative (Pre-eminent senior staff specialist) roles in running of the Gastroenterology Department and the delivery of IBD services to Metro North, Wide Bay and Central Queensland.

Dr Radford-Smith’s major research interests include: inflammatory bowel diseases (Crohn’s disease, ulcerative colitis); the utilisation of health information to optimise patient care and patient outcomes; and, the role of the gut in human disease. Dr Radford-Smith is a passionate advocate for the optimisation of patient outcomes and how we as a healthcare community can best utilise, audit and research to optimise clinical practice.

Professor James Scott leads the Child and Youth Research Group at the QIMR Berghofer. He also practices clinically as a Child and Youth Psychiatrist with the Metro North Mental Health Service, where he is the Director of the Early Psychosis Service. Professor Scott is the recipient of a National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) Practitioner Fellowship (2016-2020), awarded for his research into prevention and intervention strategies to improve the mental health of adolescents.

Professor Scott has established a program of research developing preventative strategies and cost-effective real-world interventions for mental illness in children and youth. His research incorporates studies in epidemiology, clinical trials, bullying and psychiatric neuro-immunology. He is the elected chair of the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists Section for Youth Mental Health and an editor of the Journal Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology.

Professor Powell is a Hepatologist and Senior Staff Specialist in the Department of Gastroenterology and Hepatology, Princess Alexandra Hospital. She is Clinical Director at QIMR Berghofer, Director of the Network Centre for Liver Disease Research and Professor, School of Medicine, The University of QLD.

She leads a productive research program, bridging clinical research and basic science, and mentoring the training and career development of emerging researchers and clinicians. Professor Powell has 199 career publications (Scopus Apr 2025) with over 19,000 cites (citation rates almost 4.15 times more than field average, Scival Apr 2025). She has held three 5-year NHMRC Practitioner Fellowships, and two Queensland Health Clinical Research Fellowships.

In 2025 Professor Powell received the Gastroenterological Society of Australia Distinguished Researcher Prize for her research contributions to hepatology.