Professor Jennifer Stow is a molecular cell biologist, an NHMRC Leadership Fellow and head of the Protein Trafficking and Inflammation research laboratory in The University of Queensland's Institute of Molecular Bioscience (IMB). Her previous leadership appointments include as Division Head and Deputy Director (Research) at IMB (12 years) and she currently serves on national and international advisory boards, editorial boards and steering committees, and as an elected Associate Member of the European Molecular Biology Organisation (EMBO).

Jenny Stow received her undergraduate and PhD qualifications at Melbourne's Monash University before undertaking postdoctoral training in the Department of Cell Biology at Yale University School of Medicine, USA. With training as a microscopist in kidney research, she gained further experience at Yale as a postdoc in the lab of eminent cell biologist and microscopist, Dr Marilyn Farquhar, where protein trafficking was both a theme and a passion. Jenny then took up her first faculty appointment as an Assistant Professor in the Renal Unit at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) and Harvard Medical School in Boston USA, where her research uncovered new roles for a class of enzymes, GTPases, in regulating trafficking within cells. At MGH her research also formed part of a highly successful NIH Renal Cell Biology Program. In late 1994, Jenny moved her research lab back to Australia, to The University of Queensland, in late 1994 as a Wellcome Trust International Medical Research Fellow. As part of IMB since, the Stow lab has continued a focus on protein trafficking, including pioneering live-cell imaging, to spearhead their work on trafficking in inflammation, cancer and chronic disease. Major discoveries include identifying new proteins and pathways for recycling adhesion proteins in epithelial cells, inflammatory cytokine secretion in macrophages and immune signalling through Toll-like receptors in inflammation and infection. Small GTPases of the Rab family, signalling adaptors and kinases feature among the molecules studied in the Stow lab for their functional roles and their potential as drug targets in inflammation and cancer. A keen focus is to understand the role of the fluid uptake pathway, macropinocytosis, in controlling inflammation, cancer and mucosal absorption.

Professor Stow has been awarded multiple career fellowships including from American Heart Association, Wellcome Trust and NHMRC. She has published >200 papers, cited over 15,500 times and she is the recipient of awards and honours, most recently including the 2019 President's Medal from the Australia and New Zealand Society for Cell and Developmental Biology. She is also academic head of IMB Microscopy, a world-class fluorescence microscopy and image analysis facility. Her research is funded by a variety of agencies and industry partnerships, in addition to NHMRC and ARC, including through the ARC Centre of Excellence in Quantum Biotechnology, QUBIC. The Stow lab work with national and international collaborators and welcome students and postdoctoral trainees to participate in their research. We value having a diverse, inclusive and supportive culture for research and celebrate the many diverse and wonderful successes of Stow lab alumni.

Rosemary Cater was recently recruited to UQ's Institute for Molecular Bioscience as a Group Leader and ARC DECRA Fellow. She utilizes structural biology, membrane protein biochemistry, and biophysics to understand some of the brain's most elusive yet important proteins. The overarching goal of the Cater Lab is to understand molecular mechanisms of transport at the blood-brain barrier.

Dr. Cater was awarded her PhD in 2017 from the University of Sydney, and from 2017-2023 she was a Post-Doctoral Fellow in the laboratory of Prof. Filippo Mancia at Columbia University, New York, USA. Here she used single-particle cryo-electron microscopy and antigen-binding technology to determine structures of small membrane proteins.

Highlights of her career thus far include:

• She has been awarded an ARC DECRA, an NIH K99/R00 career transition award.
• She received a 2022 Blavatnik Regional Finalist Award in Chemistry – a highly competitive award for outstanding post-doctoral research presented at the New York Academy of Sciences Annual Gala.
• She was selected as one was 1 of 120 young leaders invited from 46 countries to the 2022 Science and Technology in Society Forum (Kyoto) to discuss humanity's global challenges with politicians, CEOs, and Nobel Laureates.
• She was appointed as one of twelve Simons Society Fellows (2018-2022) – one of the USA's most competitive post-doctoral fellowships, founded in New York by billionaire philanthropist Jim Simons.
• She received a Robin Anders Young Investigator Award at the Lorne Protein Structure and Function 2020 Meeting – one of Australia's most competitive awards for early-career protein scientists.