Graham Robertson

Biography

 Dr Graham Robertson is Head of R&D at Cellmid where he is pursuing a clinical development program focussed on midkine therapeutics and diagnostics. He brings to this role many years research experience in multiple biological and pathophysiological processes incorporating both clinical studies and diverse experimental approaches. A feature of his recent research has been the application of systems biology approaches including transcriptomic, proteomic and metabolomic profiling techniques to understand complex inter-organ signalling involved in chronic inflammatory diseases.  Graham Robertson gained his PhD in molecular virology from Macquarie University, Australia before undertaking Post-Doctoral training in gene regulation and nuclear architecture at Oxford. He returned to Australia as a Post-Doc in the laboratory of Prof Emma Whitelaw at University of Sydney where he set up a transgenic mouse facility and discovered repeat-induced silencing as an epigenetic process on mammalian transgenes. Graham then moved to Westmead Hospital Millennium Institute where he pursued studies on the fibrotic liver disease NASH and the impact of inducible xenobiotic/drug interactions on drug clearance pathways. A component of this work involved creating a transgenic mouse model for studying gene regulation of human CYP3A4, the main pathway for drug metabolism.  The model was subsequently commercially leveraged as a screening tool for drug development.  At the ANZAC and Garvan Institutes in Sydney (2004-2014), Graham explored the impact of cancer-associated inflammation in repressing drug clearance leading to excessive toxicity. Graham also explored the link between chronic inflammation and disrupted energy metabolism as the basis for cancer cachexia. A key discovery from this work was the activation of thermogenesis in white & brown fat, linked to body wasting. These findings were published in Cancer Research and Cell Metabolism where it was ranked amongst the 10th highest papers in the latter journal. He has published ~60 papers with >3,000 citations.

Research Interest

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