- About
- Strategic Plan
- Structure
- Governance
- Scientific divisions
- ACRF Chemical Biology
- ACRF Stem Cells and Cancer
- Bioinformatics
- Cancer and Haematology
- Cell Signalling and Cell Death
- Development and Cancer
- Immunology
- Infection and Immunity
- Inflammation
- Molecular Genetics of Cancer
- Molecular Immunology
- Molecular Medicine
- Population Health and Immunity
- Structural Biology
- Systems Biology and Personalised Medicine
- Laboratory operations
- Funding
- Annual reports
- Human research ethics
- Scientific integrity
- Institute life
- Career opportunities
- Business Development
- Partnering opportunities
- Opportunities in platform technologies
- A complete cure for HBV
- A stable efficacious Toxoplasma vaccine
- Activating SMCHD1 to treat FSHD
- Fut8 Sugar coating immuno oncology
- Intercepting inflammation with RIPK2 inhibitors
- Novel checkpoints NK cells emerge as key players in IO
- Precision epigenetics silencing SMCHD1 to treat Prader Willi Syndrome
- Rethinking CD52 a therapy for autoimmune disease
- Targeting plasmacytoid dendritic cells for systemic lupus erythematosus
- Treating Epstein-Barr virus associated malignancies
- Royalties distribution
- Start-up companies
- Partnering opportunities
- Collaborators
- Publications repository
- Awards
- Discoveries
- Centenary 2015
- History
- Contact us
- Research
- Diseases
- Research fields
- Bioinformatics
- Cancer biology
- Cell death
- Cell signalling
- Clinical translation
- Computational biology
- Drug discovery
- Epigenetics
- Flow cytometry
- Genomics
- Haematology
- Imaging
- Immunology
- Infection
- Inflammation
- Medicinal chemistry
- Personalised medicine
- Proteomics
- Stem cells
- Structural biology
- Systems biology
- Vaccine development
- People
- Anne-Laure Puaux
- Associate Professor Aaron Jex
- Associate Professor Alyssa Barry
- Associate Professor Andrew Webb
- Associate Professor Anne Voss
- Associate Professor Chris Tonkin
- Associate Professor Daniel Gray
- Associate Professor Edwin Hawkins
- Associate Professor Grant Dewson
- Associate Professor Isabelle Lucet
- Associate Professor James Murphy
- Associate Professor Jeanne Tie
- Associate Professor Jeff Babon
- Associate Professor Joan Heath
- Associate Professor Justin Boddey
- Associate Professor Marco Herold Marco Herold
- Associate Professor Marnie Blewitt
- Associate Professor Matthew Ritchie
- Associate Professor Mike Lawrence
- Associate Professor Nicholas Huntington
- Associate Professor Oliver Sieber
- Associate Professor Rachel Wong
- Associate Professor Sandra Nicholson
- Associate Professor Seth Masters
- Associate Professor Sumitra Ananda
- Associate Professor Tim Thomas
- Associate Professor Wai-Hong Tham
- Associate Professor Wei Shi
- Catherine Parker
- Dr Anna Coussens
- Dr Ashley Ng
- Dr Ben Tran
- Dr Bob Anderson
- Dr Brad Sleebs
- Dr David Komander
- Dr Diana Hansen
- Dr Drew Berry
- Dr Emma Josefsson
- Dr Ethan Goddard-Borger
- Dr Gary Pitt
- Dr Gwo Yaw Ho
- Dr Hui-Li Wong
- Dr Hélène Jousset Sabroux
- Dr Ian Majewski
- Dr Ian Street
- Dr Jacqui Gulbis
- Dr James Vince
- Dr Jason Tye-Din
- Dr Joanna Groom
- Dr John Wentworth
- Dr Julie Mercer
- Dr Kate Sutherland
- Dr Kelly Rogers
- Dr Ken Pang
- Dr Leanne Robinson
- Dr Leigh Coultas
- Dr Lucy Gately
- Dr Margaret Lee
- Dr Marie-Liesse Asselin-Labat
- Dr Mary Ann Anderson
- Dr Maryam Rashidi
- Dr Matthew Call
- Dr Melissa Call
- Dr Melissa Davis
- Dr Michael Low
- Dr Misty Jenkins
- Dr Peter Czabotar
- Dr Philippe Bouillet
- Dr Priscilla Auyeung
- Dr Rhys Allan
- Dr Ruth Kluck
- Dr Samar Ojaimi
- Dr Samir Taoudi
- Dr Sant-Rayn Pasricha
- Dr Shalin Naik
- Dr Sheau Wen Lok
- Dr Simon Chatfield
- Dr Stephen Wilcox
- Dr Tracy Putoczki
- Guillaume Lessene
- Helene Martin
- Keely Bumsted O'Brien
- Mr Joel Chibert
- Mr Simon Monard
- Mr Stan Balbata
- Mr Steve Droste
- Ms Carolyn MacDonald
- Ms Samantha Ludolf
- Ms Wendy Hertan
- Professor Alan Cowman
- Professor Andreas Strasser
- Professor Andrew Lew
- Professor Andrew Roberts
- Professor Clare Scott
- Professor David Huang
- Professor David Vaux
- Professor Doug Hilton
- Professor Gabrielle Belz
- Professor Geoff Lindeman
- Professor Gordon Smyth
- Professor Ian Wicks
- Professor Ivo Mueller
- Professor Jane Visvader
- Professor Jerry Adams
- Professor John Silke
- Professor Ken Shortman
- Professor Leonard C Harrison
- Professor Li Wu
- Professor Lynn Corcoran
- Professor Marc Pellegrini
- Professor Melanie Bahlo
- Professor Nicos Nicola
- Professor Peter Colman
- Professor Peter Gibbs
- Professor Phil Hodgkin
- Professor Stephen Nutt
- Professor Suzanne Cory
- Professor Terry Speed
- Professor Tony Burgess
- Professor Tony Papenfuss
- Professor Warren Alexander
- Education
- PhD
- Honours
- Masters
- Undergraduate
- Student research projects
- 3D and 4D imaging of thymic T cell differentiation
- Activating https://www.wehi.edu.au/node/add/individual-student-research-page#Parkin to treat Parkinson’s disease
- Activation, regulation, and biological roles of E3 ubiquitin ligases
- Bioinformatics methods for detecting and making sense of somatic genomic rearrangements
- Characterising regulatory T cells in coeliac disease
- Computational melanoma genomics
- Deep profiling of blood cancers during targeted therapy
- Defining the role of necroptosis in platelet production and function
- Determining the migration signals leading to protective immune responses
- Developing mucolytics to treat chronic respiratory diseases
- Developing new tools to visualise necroptotic cell death
- Development of live-cell, automated microscopy techniques for studying malaria
- Development of tools to inform malaria vaccine design
- Discovering new genetic causes of primary antibody deficiencies
- Discovery of novel drug combinations for the treatment of bowel cancer
- Dissecting the induction and integration of T cell migration cues
- Drug targets and compounds that block growth of malaria parasites
- Effects of nutrition on immunity and infection in Asia and Africa
- Eosinophil and neutrophil heterogeneity
- Eosinophil maturation
- Epigenetic regulation of systemic iron homeostasis
- Functional differences between young and old platelets
- Generation of cytokine antagonists
- Genetic dissection of mechanisms of Plasmodium invasion
- Genomic characterisation of epigenetic regulators involved in X inactivation
- High resolution 3-dimensional imaging to characterise metastatic cancers
- High-resolution imaging of host cell invasion by the malaria parasite
- Home renovations: understanding how Toxoplasma redecorates its host cell
- How the epigenetic regulator SMCHD1 works and how to target it to treat disease
- Human monoclonal antibodies against malaria infection
- Identification of malaria parasite entry receptors
- Identification of new therapeutic opportunities for pancreatic cancer
- Identifying disease-causing haplotypes with hidden Markov models
- Interleukin-11 in gastrointestinal bacterial infections
- Investigating mechanisms of cell death and survival using zebrafish
- Investigating new paths to selective modulation of potassium channels
- Let me in! How Toxoplasma invades human cells
- Long-read sequencing for transcriptome and epigenome analysis
- Macro-evolution in cancer
- Mapping DNA repair networks in cancer
- Mapping how multiple malaria episodes are related
- Modelling gene regulatory systems
- Modulation of immune responses by immunosuppressive chemokines
- Molecular basis for inherited Parkinson’s disease mechanism of PINK1
- Mucus at the molecular level
- Novel cell death and inflammatory modulators in lupus
- Plasmodium vivax host-parasite interactions: impact on immunity
- Predicting drug response in cancer
- Programming T cells to defend against infections
- Reconstructing the immune response: from molecules to cells to systems
- Regulation of cytokine signalling
- Screening for regulators of jumping genes
- Target identification of potent antimalarial agents
- Targeting the immune system in cancer
- The role of interleukin-11 in acute myeloid leukaemia
- Transmembrane control of type I cytokine receptor activation
- Uncovering the roles of long non-coding RNAs in human bowel cancer
- Understanding retinal eye diseases with retinal transcriptomic data analysis
- Understanding the role of stromal cells in pancreatic cancer growth
- Unravelling the tumour suppressor network in models of lung cancer
- Utilising pre-clinical models to discover novel therapies for tuberculosis
- Zombieland: evolution of a dead enzyme that kills cells by necroptosis
- School resources
- Frequently asked questions
- Student profiles
- Abebe Fola
- Casey Ah-Cann
- Catia Pierotti
- Charlotte Slade
- Daniel Cameron
- Emma Nolan
- Jason Brouwer
- Joy Liu
- Lucille Rankin
- Rebecca Delconte
- Roberto Bonelli
- Rune Larsen
- Sarah Garner
- Simona Seizova
- Michael Low
- Sofonias Tessema
- Santini Subramaniam
- Miles Horton
- Alexandra Gurzau
- Tamara Marcus
- Nicholas Chandler
- Student achievements
- Student association
- News
- Donate
- Online donation
- Ways to support
- Support outcomes
- Supporter stories
- Rotarians against breast cancer
- A partnership to improve treatments for cancer patients
- 20 years of cancer research support from the Helpman family
- A generous gift from a cancer survivor
- A gift to support excellence in Australian medical research
- An enduring friendship
- Anonymous donor helps bridge the 'valley of death'
- Renewed support for HIV eradication project
- Searching for solutions to muscular dystrophy
- Supporting research into better treatments for colon cancer
- Taking a single cell focus with the DROP-seq
- WEHI.TV
A tribute to Dave Kemp
1945 - 2013
Dave was an exceptional and highly respected scientist and a great friend to many of us here at the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute.
He grew up in Adelaide and spent much of his undergraduate years at Adelaide University playing Double Bass at various jazz clubs. Fortunately, he spent enough time studying to scrape through his degree. He discovered his great love of scientific research whilst doing his PhD with Dr George Rogers at the University of Adelaide. Indeed, he published a manuscript in Nature on the organisation of feather keratin genes for which he was the only author, an amazing feat for a PhD student and an indication of his outstanding scientific talent.
Early years
The early years of Dave's career coincided with the start of the recombinant DNA technology revolution and he spent a year at CSIRO as a research scientist with Jim Peacock (which he explained to his friends, was preparation for his time in Stanford - he didn't want to appear a novice in that place of great science). This was followed by a two-year postdoctoral stint with renowned Drosophila geneticist David Hogness further honing these skills. He contributed to the development of northern blots to detect RNA, together with George Stark and Jim Alwine, a technique that is still used today, and their PNAS paper has had over 1800 citations.
Working at the institute
In 1979, Dave returned to Australia and took up a position at the institute working with Jerry Adams and Suzanne Cory on the arrangement of immunoglobulin genes. A major contribution was the first cloning of linked variable region genes in the immunoglobulin heavy chain locus.
In 1980 he switched fields to parasitology and joined the Unit of Parasitology headed by Graham Mitchell. Together with Robin Anders, Dave developed a method for screening expression libraries with antibodies from the serum of infected individuals, and used this to isolate Plasmodium falciparum genes, hunting for those that might be candidates for vaccine development. In 1984, he initiated innovative studies separating malaria chromosomes using the new technology of pulse field gel electrophoresis and this provided the basis to understand the structure and arrangement of the genome and ultimately the sequencing of the genome for this human pathogen. This led to rapid development of the field and the institute quickly became a major centre, internationally renowned for its innovative research in malaria.
Dave was an outstanding molecular biologist and noted for his technological innovation with the development of a number of techniques. One example of this is inverse Polymerase Chain Reaction (iPCR), an idea that Dave conceived whilst having a shower, soon after the initial development of PCR by Kary Mullis in 1983, and he quickly developed this technique together with Tony Triglia. Dave's technological brilliance forged a great creative relationship between his lab and the Engineering Department. Many lab gadgets were thus designed and manufactured, including the institute's first robotic PCR machines, with dipping arms and water baths, and the huge cooling pumps and baths for the pulsed-field gels with which the malaria chromosomes were first revealed. Dave's passion ensured that cutting-edge technologies developed in the world's top research centres would be adopted instantly in the far outpost of Melbourne.
After the institute
Dave was appointed Head of the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute's Immunoparasitology Unit in 1990, a position he held until 1992 when he became Deputy Director of the Menzies School of Health in Darwin. During that year he was also appointed as a Howard Hughes Medical Institute International Research Scholar. He continued his world leading research in malaria genetics and also embarked on new studies attempting to alleviate the impact of diseases such as scabies on our indigenous population. Using molecular fingerprinting, he showed that the scabies mite from human and dog hosts in Ohio, Panama and Aboriginal communities in northern Australia were genetically distinct, and therefore that control programs for human scabies in endemic areas did not require resources directed against zoonotic infection from dogs. Dave played a very active role in encouraging indigenous trainees and was very proud that first indigenous graduate at the Menzies was from his lab. In 2000, he moved to the Queensland Institute of Medical Research in Brisbane where he headed the Malaria and Arbovirus Unit.
Awards
Dave Kemp received many distinguished awards, including the Boehringer-Mannheim Medal of the Australian Biochemical Society (1981), the Wellcome Prize for diagnostics (1992), a Centenary Medal (2003) and a Medal in the Order of Australia in the General Division (OAM) (2008) and was elected to the Australian Academy of Science in 1996.
Work and play
Whilst Dave Kemp was an exceptional scientist and contributed enormously to research, his contributions are much broader. He was a wonderful mentor and central to the development of the malaria field in Australia. Many of us remember fondly Dave's great love of science and joyful reactions when new results were revealed 'hot off the developer'. Indeed Dave often made the comment that 'we have a great life as we are paid to come to work and play'. That was the ethos that he brought to his research and it was infectious, making his laboratory and the Division a 'fun' place to work and do science. He didn't operate a hierarchy, but lead with insight, informality, respect and humour.
Dave retained a great love of music all his life and in the different institutes he worked, including the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute, he formed bands that played gigs at various work functions. At the institute he formed the 'Tandem Repeats' (a name that came out of the discovery at the institute that many malaria antigen genes consisted of tandem repeat sequences) and many of us remember the parties where his band had the foundations shaking with the music and dancing. He was also an avid 'rock hound' and loved heading out into the wilderness to camp under the stars and search for special rocks and minerals.
In 2006, Dave and his wife Katherine (now deceased), a highly committed nurse, moved to tranquil Tallangatta, Victoria, where they were very happy. They are survived by sons Andrew, Ben and Daniel and grandchildren Rachael, Jessica and Ryan.
Professor Alan Cowman, Associate Professor Lynn Corcoran and Professor Suzanne Cory