Researcher, Professor Ian Frazer of the University of Queensland (UQ), has been awarded the Smart State Premier's Fellowship. The prestigious Fellowship comes on top of his recent Australian of the Year award for his work in developing a vaccine for cervical cancer. Under the Smart State Premier's Fellowship, Professor Ian Frazer will get $250,000 a year for the next five years for his UQ Centre for Immunology and Cancer Research at Brisbane’s Princess Alexandra Hospital. Professor Frazer said the money would help further the development of therapeutic vaccines.
The Smart State Premier's Fellowships provide funding to entice experienced and distinguished researchers of national and international prominence to lead research teams in Queensland universities, research institutes, government agencies or industry research facilities.Prof Frazer said on ABC Radio, that though The Australian of the Year is a great honour but it is very much an honorary title, and now this fellowship will help him to build up his team and get new initiatives going in the way of research, specifically towards the vaccines that they have been striving to get for the last few years.
Deputy Premier, Treasurer and Minister for State Development, Trade and Innovation Anna Bligh announced the funding today who was in Chicago as part of a trade mission. Stating that the Professor Frazer has put Queensland on the map with his ground breaking scientific achievements. She said that the fellowship money would help Prof Frazer translate the success of the cervical cancer vaccine to other cancers and infections.
The professor has been researching the cause of cervical cancer for the past 20 years and has proven the link between cervical cancers and the papilloma virus. He has also developed the world's first vaccine for cervical cancer. This cancer alone kills 270,000 women each year.
