We are delighted to welcome Dr Jane Mullaney (Ngati Porou/Ngati Raukawa) to the HVN Challenge as our new Kaiarataki Vision Māturanga – HVN Vision Mātauranga Leader.
Jane obtained her MSc in microbiology in 2009 from Massey University. In 2010 she was the recipient of a Massey Doctoral Scholarship and Riddet CORE scholarship studying the bioactives in broccoli and the interactions with the gut microbiome. She obtained her PhD in 2013 and took up a postdoctoral position at the University of Queensland Diamantina Institute (UQDI). In 2014 she was awarded a Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation post-doctoral fellowship at UQDI where she worked on the role of the microbiome in type 1 diabetes.
Returning to New Zealand in 2017, she joined AgResearch to work on the HVN Priority Research Programmes for Infant and Digestive Health and is currently an Associate Investigator for these programmes. Additionally, she led a Vision Mātauranga programme on developing New Zealand grown bananas through tissue culture, which she continues to develop. She is now a Senior Scientist at AgResearch, Adjunct Senior Researcher for Massey University and an Associate Investigator for the Riddet Institute. Her key expertise is in the microbiome, but she is always interested in anything involving plants, people, animals, health through nutrition and is a keen finch breeder of Gouldians.
Jane is also part of the research team of two HVN Contestable Fund project: working with the Macorja Group to develop a Rongoā beverage and with Ngāti Kuia in Nelson-Marlborough on understanding and characterising the effects of maramataka of Kānuka harvesting.