Day 2 - Keynote address & panel forum
Tuesday 27 October 2026
12:30pm - 1:30pm | Lecture Theatre | Hybrid Event
Event Theme: Research for a Resilient Future: Reimagining What's Possible
How will today's research shape the healthcare systems of tomorrow?
Join us for Research Week's flagship forum as leading researchers, innovators and industry experts explore the technologies and discoveries transforming patient care and helping build more resilient health systems.
Featuring an international keynote address from Professor Thomas Oxley, Chief Executive Officer of Synchron, this dynamic session will provide unique insights into the future of healthcare innovation, from groundbreaking neurotechnology and artificial intelligence to precision medicine and translational research.
Hosted by renowned health journalist Emily Rice, the event will also feature an expert panel showcasing cutting-edge research that is advancing healthcare in real-world settings. Speakers will share their latest work and discuss the opportunities and challenges of translating scientific discoveries into meaningful patient outcomes.
Featured Speakers
- Professor Thomas Oxley, Chief Executive Officer, Synchron (Keynote)
- Adj A/Prof Shiva Akbarzadeh, Monash University, bioengineered skin technologies
- Dr Rebecca Harper, Baker Heart and Diabetes Institute, heart cell "biological barcodes"
- A/Prof Vivek Naranbhai, The Alfred and Monash University, AI-designed proteins for cancer treatment
The session will conclude with a live audience Q&A, offering attendees the opportunity to engage directly with our speakers and explore the future possibilities of healthcare research.
Be part of the conversation as we reimagine what's possible and discover how research is driving a more resilient future for healthcare.
More about the panel
Professor Thomas Oxley
Professor Thomas Oxley MBBS BMedSc FRACP PhD is a vascular and interventional neurologist and world expert in brain computer interfaces. Dr Oxley is the founding CEO of Synchron, a neurotechnology company based in New York City, having raised over USD$345 million in capital. Synchron is a clinical stage company developing an endovascular implantable brain computer interface, StentrodeTM. The Synchron BCI is a minimally invasive brain implant for people with debilitating medical illnesses designed to restore autonomy by reconnecting them online in ways that can dramatically improve their lives.
He is a Clinical Instructor and Director of Research and Development at Mount Sinai. Attending in the Department of Neurosurgery, Mount Sinai Hospital, New York City. Dr Oxley has performed over 1600 endovascular neurosurgical procedures, including cerebral aneurysm coiling and clot retrievals in acute stroke. Dr Oxley has published over 120 internationally peer reviewed articles in journals including JAMA Neurology, Nature Biotechnology, Nature Biomedical Engineering, New England Journal of Medicine and The Lancet. He has over 100 patents filed. He is also Professor of Medicine, University of Melbourne, Australia.
Adjunct Associate Professor Shiva Akbarzadeh
Adjunct Associate Professor Shiva Akbarzadeh heads Skin Bioengineering Laboratory at Victorian Adult Burns Service, Bayside Health, dedicated to bench to bedside research in cell therapies for burns treatment. Her innovations and leadership in this field has been recognised by a number of publications in peer review high ranked journals and patents. She has secured over AUD $2.5M funding for burns research and is a recipient of a number of national and international prizes in cell therapy and wound care. Her team have successfully completed manufacturing of their novel bioengineered skin and treatment of burns patients in a phase 1 trial conducted at the Alfred between 2024-2026. She is the curator of a postgraduate module on “Skin Stem cell and Therapies”, that is taught at Monash University since 2021.
Dr Rebecca Harper
Dr Rebecca Harper obtained her PhD from the University of Adelaide School of Medicine and completed postdoctoral training at Stanford University School of Medicine and the National Institutes of Health in the United States. She is now the Leader of the Vascular Regeneration and Repair Group in the Heart Failure Research Lab at the Baker Heart and Diabetes Institute, Melbourne, under Professor David Kaye.
Rebecca’s research focuses on understanding vascular cellular ecosystems in cardiovascular disease, with a particular interest in how endothelial, stromal and immune cell populations remodel after injury and during heart failure. Her program integrates next generation technologies such as single-cell and spatial transcriptomics, DNA barcoded lineage tracing and translational disease models to define how vascular and cardiac cellular states evolve over time.
A/Prof Vivek Naranbhai
A/Prof Vivek Naranbhai is a globally recognised clinician-scientist, medical oncologist and immunologist whose groundbreaking research is shaping the future of cancer treatment, vaccines and engineered immunity. Recently recruited to The Alfred/Monash University from Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts General Hospital, he leads the Laboratory of Translational Immunology, where his team combines artificial intelligence, protein design and immunology to develop next-generation medicines.