EXPERTS SEARCH

My academic identity is grounded in the belief that excellent teaching, impactful research and meaningful professional engagement are mutually reinforcing. With 10 years of teaching experience in Medical Imaging across the UAE "Fatima College of Health Sciences" (2015–2019), Monash University (2019–2022) and Deakin University (since 2022) Australia. I am continuously committed to preparing graduates who are not only clinically competent but also critical thinkers, evidence-informed practitioners and future leaders of the profession.

 

During this time, I have also being employed clinically nation-wide (Australia) in various public and private hospitals and clinics since then, including positions in Metropolitan Perth and Melbourne. 

 

Jessie Adams is an Associate Research Fellow at Deakin University's National Centre for Farmer Health (NCFH), where her research focuses on improving the health, wellbeing and safety of farmers, their families, and rural communities through applied, collaborative and translational research.

 

Growing up on a family farm provided Jessie with firsthand insight into the opportunities and challenges of rural life and continues to shape her research priorities. Since joining the NCFH in 2018, she has contributed to various research projects addressing child farm safety, farmer suicide prevention, agricultural health and medicine education, the health impacts of extreme heat, chronic kidney disease, needlestick injuries, tailored farmer health and wellbeing assessments and agricultural community resilience. Her research has resulted in peer-reviewed publications, conference presentations, research reports and industry resources, contributing to the evidence base for agricultural and rural health.

 

Jessie completed her PhD at Deakin University investigating the injury risk and safety behaviours among children on Victorian farms, establishing expertise in child farm safety and agricultural injury prevention. In recognition of her growing contribution to the field, she was awarded a Churchill Fellowship in 2024 to investigate international approaches to child farm safety across Ireland, Canada and the United States. This work strengthened her international research networks and will inform future directions for child farm safety research, policy and practice in Australia. A key focus of Jessie's work is ensuring research findings translate into meaningful outcomes for the communities they are intended to benefit.

 

Alongside her role at Deakin, Jessie is the Western Alliance Research Translation Coordinator across Western District Health Service and South West Healthcare. In this role, she supports research capacity building, research translation and collaboration between researchers, clinicians, health services and communities across western Victoria. This work complements her research activities by strengthening pathways between evidence generation and real-world implementation, with the ultimate goal of improving health outcomes for rural and regional communities.

 

Dr. Eslam Ahmed is a Lecturer in Medical Sciences with over 15 years of experience in medical education across national and international institutions. He contributes extensively to the Doctor of Medicine (MD) program, delivering content that integrates problem-based learning (PBL), clinical case-based discussions, and medical imaging to strengthen students’ clinical reasoning and diagnostic interpretation.

 

I’m proud to lead the Rural Training Stream (RTS) at the Ararat Campus, where I’m deeply passionate about supporting rural students to study medicine within their own communities and family support systems. My goal is to ensure that every rural student feels connected, confident, and well supported — developing teaching and learning strategies that create an experience equivalent to their peers studying in metropolitan campuses, not isolated but fully integrated into Deakin’s vibrant medical learning community.

 

Dr. Ahmed has significant experience in anatomical and pathological sciences, teaching with cadaveric and donor bodies, 3D digital anatomy and pathology models, and high-fidelity synthetic models such as the Syndaver. His teaching practice emphasizes an integrated, student-centered approach that bridges biomedical science with clinical relevance, enhancing student engagement and understanding of human structure and disease mechanisms.

 

His research interests lie at the intersection of neuroscience and molecular psychiatry, particularly exploring the neuroimmune mechanisms underlying lung-brain interactions and their relevance to mental health disorders. His work focuses on gene expression profiling and neuroinflammatory signaling pathways within key brain regions, contributing to the growing field of translational neurobiology and psychoneuroimmunology.

I am a clinical optometrist and educator committed to preparing graduates for contemporary and evolving optometry practice. My work focuses on developing core employability capabilities through authentic learning experiences that foster clinical reasoning, patient-centred communication, and culturally responsive care. I am committed to advancing culturally responsive education and improving outcomes for Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander peoples through respectful partnerships with Indigenous colleagues, communities, and knowledge holders. I have a particular interest in the use of innovative digital technologies to create realistic simulations that enable students to practise complex clinical skills and clinical decision-making within psychologically safe learning environments.

 

I manage the Lorne branch of the Deakin Collaborative Eyecare Clinic, which delivers community eye care while creating unique rural placement opportunities that support student learning, workforce readiness, and engagement with regional practice.

Dr. Jasmin Akter is a Wellcome Trust Early Career Award Fellow, working as a Research fellow at the Deakin University, Health Education and Research Building (HERB) in Geelong Victoria and part of the Institute for Physical and Mental Health and Clinical Translation (IMPACT) and the Centre for Innovation in Infectious Disease and Immunology Research (CIIDIR)  in Prof. Alyssa E. Barry’s group in a collaboration study with the International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh (icddr,b) on malaria genomics.

 

She has working experience in infectious diseases research for more than 15 years, with highly cited publications in malaria, enteric parasitic, and bacterial diseases.

 

She is focused on establishing a sustainable, high-throughput molecular surveillance platform to monitor anti-malaria drug resistance, and transmission dynamics and provide early warning signals to prevent widespread resistance to artemisinin and partner drugs in Bangladesh. Her study will generate genomic data on antimalarial drug resistance and parasite relatedness and establish the capacity for processing the data to inform the National Malaria Elimination Programme (NMEP) in Bangladesh with clear intelligence on where to upscale interventions, conduct the clinical survey, change drug policy and share the data with WWARN.

Veterinarian and veterinary pathologist, virologist and epidemiologist with more that 33 years of international experience. Focus on virus infections and one health.

Dr Laura Alston is a Senior Research Fellow at Deakin Rural Health and is the inaugral Director of Research at Colac Area Health. Dr Alston, in collaboration with leaders from Deakin Rural Health and Colac Area Health established one of few rural health services-led research units in rural Australia. The Research Unit has led to multiple publications, grants and research tranlsation. Dr Laura Alston was a National Health Foundation Post-Doctoral Research Fellow (2019-2022) and World Heart Federation Emerging Leader Fellow. Dr Alston is also an Accredited Practising Dietitian and holds both a PhD and a Masters of Business Administration( Health Services Speciality).Dr Laura Alston is rurally-based and passionate about making a meaningful contribution to rural health both in Australia and globally.Dr Alston's research on rural health equity and rural health services has significantly advanced the evidence base, increased recognition of rural health services research, and has influencing policy and clinical practice. Dr Alston is an early/mid-career researcher (5 years post PhD) that has built a comprehensive research program with partnerships across health services, governments and University Departments of Rural Health.

 

Dr Alston is the recipient of two competitive fellowships, is an investigator on $33.1 million in research funding and has more than 120 publications.

 

Dr Alston has won academic awards including Heart Foundation Collaboration award (2021), 020-2021-National Heart Foundation Postdoctoral Research Fellowship (102530); 2019 World Heart Federation Emerging Leader; 2019 NHMRC Centre For Research Excellence (RE-FRESH) Early Career Knowledge Translation Award; 2018 Graduate Women Victoria PhD Research award; 2018 Western Alliance Associate Research Fellowship; 2018 Nomination Best Review Award Heart Lung and Circulation

 

 

Dr Kara Anderson is an early career researcher building a portfolio of research with a strong focus on bone health in the context of healthy ageing, and an interest in how bone health connects to other non-communicable conditions including cardiovascular conditions and polyendocrine metabolic ovarian syndrome. They are also interested in how technologies and tools can support diagnosis and management of health conditions, including self-advocacy.

 

Kara is equally passionate about supporting developing researchers and academics, and is current co-chair of the School of Medicine Early and Mid Career Academics and Researchers Committee, where she drives initiatives related to career development, peer support and mentorship. They have also served on the Early Career Investigator Committee (2022-2025) and Communications Committee (2022-2026), including as Acting Chair of both committees, at the Australian New Zealand Bone and Mineral Society (ANZBMS), championing young researchers in their field. 

 

She has presented her work both nationally and internationally, including oral presentations at the International Osteoporosis Foundation 9th Asia-Pacific Osteoporosis Conference in Tokyo (2025), the Fragility Fracture Network Global Congress (Melbourne, 2022) and ANZBMS (2017, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024, 2026). Locally, she has engaged with community, presenting her work from the Geelong Osteoporosis Study to clinician stakeholders from Lake Imaging, and the Melbourne Bone Group. 

 

Kara has provided peer review to a number of leading journals in her field, including Journal of Bone and Mineral Research, Bone, Osteoporosis International, BMC Musculoskeletal Disorders, Calcified Tissue International and BMC Public Health. Additionally, she has contributed to development of conference programs and peer review of abstracts at meetings including ANZBMS annual scientific meetings and Deakin University Health HDR Conferences.