Two Monash University researchers have received the prestigious Viertel Fellowships, worth $1.375 million each, to advance cutting-edge research in artificial intelligence and cancer biology.
The Sylvia and Charles Viertel Charitable Foundation, in partnership with Bellberry, announced the three recipients of the 2025 Viertel Senior Medical Research Fellowships this week. Two of the three awardees are from Monash University. Each Fellowship supports mid-career researchers conducting innovative work that has the potential to transform healthcare outcomes in Australia and abroad.
Associate Professor Zongyuan Ge, from the Faculty of Information Technology’s AIM for Health Lab, has been named this year’s Bellberry-Viertel Fellow, becoming the first AI scientist to receive the Fellowship. He is developing Australia’s first Unified Phenotype Foundation Model—an artificial intelligence system that integrates patient data such as scans, images, clinical notes, and medical histories to improve early diagnosis and treatment.
“It is an incredible honour to be recognised by the Sylvia and Charles Viertel Charitable Foundation and Bellberry,” Associate Professor Ge said. “This Fellowship will allow us to build a new unified foundation for medical AI—one that learns from the full picture of a person’s health and can drive earlier, more accurate and more equitable care for the diverse healthcare needs of the Australian population.”
Dr Dustin Flanagan, from the Monash Biomedicine Discovery Institute, has been awarded a Fellowship to investigate how tissue damage contributes to the development and spread of gastric cancer. His research focuses on how inflammation and cell regeneration alter cell identity and drive cancer formation, with the aim of uncovering new approaches for prevention and treatment.
“Understanding how tissue damage triggers the earliest steps of cancer could open new avenues for prevention and treatment,” Dr Flanagan said. “It has taken us a few years to get to this point, but my team are now on the verge of understanding how common-place tissue damage changes the way pre-cancerous and established cancer cells behave. Because of the substantial support from the Viertel Foundation, we are now in a position to accelerate our research and identify new intervention points (drug targets) that could make a real difference to cancer patients.”
Monash University’s Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research and Enterprise) Professor Robyn Ward AM said the Fellowships reflected the strength of the university’s research culture and its commitment to improving health outcomes through collaboration and innovation.
“Together, Associate Professor Ge and Dr Flanagan represent the interdisciplinary spirit that defines Monash research and enterprise,” Professor Ward said. “These Awards are a testament to the calibre of researchers at Monash who are shaping the future of healthcare to improve lives across communities through both scientific discovery and technological innovation.”
The Viertel Foundation, managed with co-trustees Justice Debra Mullins AO, Paul de Silva, and Peter Evans, was established with an initial $60 million bequest and now distributes around $9 million annually to medical research projects across Australia. It currently holds assets of about $260 million.
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