Gastroenterology clinician researchers have been awarded $13 million by the NHMRC for research projects according to its list of outcomes for the 2021 NHMRC Grant Application Round.

• Professor Michael Kamm of the University of Melbourne was awarded $2.93 million to conduct research into  microbiome manipulation to treat Crohn’s Disease. His proposal noted that immunosuppressive therapies for inflammatory bowel disease cause side effects and often don’t achieve remission. “Targeting gut bacteria, which cause these disorders, is a promising alternative strategy. My programs have shown that faecal transplantation (FMT) is effective in ulcerative colitis, and identified key causative & protective bacteria. I will now assess FMT in Crohn’s disease, define how diet & bacteria combined cause inflammation, and identify bacteria causing disease complications.”
• Also at Melbourne University, Associate Professor  Peter De Cruz receives $1.46 million NHMRC investigator grant to explore different ways of improving Outcomes in inflammatory bowel disease patients. “IBD is thought to result from an inherited tendency to develop an exaggerated immune response to the gut bugs.  IBD adversely impacts patients’ quality of life, psychological and social functioning. This research program seeks to develop new treatments and use existing treatments more effectively, discover factors contributing to IBD development and explore cost-effective ways of optimally caring for patients,” he says.
• The basic science behind IBD will be explored by Professor Kate Schroderof the University of Queensland, who receives $2.87 million to investigate inflammasome inhibitors as new first-in-class anti-inflammatory therapies. According to her NHMRC proposal, inflammation drives many devastating human diseases, and there are currently no effective treatments for many such diseases. “My research program aims to leverage my validated discovery and development pipeline to deliver new first-in-class anti-inflammatory drugs to treat devastating diseases such as chronic liver disease and inflammatory bowel disease.”
• The role of gut immunity in IBD and other GI diseases will be investigated by Dr Roland Ruscher at James Cook University, Queensland, who receives $600,700. His project will investigate age-associated properties of intraepithelial lymphocytes, and their relation to intestinal diseases. “While the peak onset age of IBD lies in early adulthood, colorectal cancer predominantly affects people over 50 years of age. How gut immunity fails in the context of age is poorly understood,” his proposal states. “This program will establish cornerstones of the intestinal immune system over different stages in life, and thereby help to design better treatment strategies that are adjusted to an individual’s age.
• The NHMRC is also funding hepatology research. Associate Professor Mohammed Eslam at Sydney University receives  $1.27 million for his work on leveraging human genetics to inform treatment in fatty liver disease. “Fatty liver disease affects one in three Australians and a quarter will develop liver failure or cancer; it has no drug treatments,” he notes. “The disease is characterised by tremendous variability in its clinical course, in part due to a lack of understanding of its genetic basis. To move towards personalised medicine, this program will undertake human and small animal studies to develop novel gene-based tests for diagnostics and risk classification and identify genes that are targets for drug development.
• For colorectal cancer, Dr Mollie Wassa of Flinders University, South Australia, receives $650,740 for work on personalising colorectal cancer prevention strategies with a risk stratification tool. Her program aims to explore the potential to vary the recommendation for high risk people to have colonoscopies every 3-5 years, with personalisation based on an individual’s risk factors such as age, diet and lifestyle. “This study will develop a computerised risk factor tool to personalise cancer prevention strategies for this high-risk subgroup of the population thereby utilising colonoscopy resources more efficiently,” she says.
• And with Australis struggling to identify and treat patients with chronic hepatitis C, Professor Jason Grebely  of the University of NSW, Sydney, receives $1.35 million for the ETHOS III Study into enhancing hepatitis C testing and treatment among people who inject drugs in drug treatment settings. “Progress towards hepatitis C elimination has been slowed,” he writes. “Given that most people with hepatitis C have a history of injecting drug use, reducing hepatitis C burden requires scale-up of enhanced testing and treatment for people who inject drugs. This Partnership project will evaluate an intervention to enhance hepatitis C testing and treatment in drug treatment clinics and develop a translational framework to scale-up hepatitis C care in this setting nationally.
• Research into the pain processes that underpin irritable bowel syndrome will be carried out by Professor Stuart Brierley of Flinders University, SA, with a $2.17 million grant to identify the underlying causes and discovering novel therapeutic treatments for chronic visceral pain (CVP). A major but underappreciated clinical, social and economic burden, CVP is implicated in IBS, endometriosis and bladder pain syndrome, all of which lack effective treatments. “Using scientific models, human biospecimens and translational science my program will identify the causes of these prevalent forms of chronic pain and develop novel treatments for these debilitating conditions,” he says.