Melissa Reichelt

Dr Melissa Reichelt is a Senior Lecturer and tenured teaching and research academic in the School of Biomedical Sciences at The University of Queensland. She heads the Cardiac Disease and Therapy laboratory, which integrates advanced physiological assessments of cardiac function with molecular techniques for targeted, cell-specific gene manipulation to understand how the heart adapts to stress in health and disease. Reichelt completed her PhD in cardiovascular physiology at Griffith University, followed by postdoctoral positions at the Victor Chang Cardiac Research Institute in Sydney, the University of California, San Diego in the USA, and as an NHMRC Peter Doherty Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Melbourne. Her research expertise encompasses key receptors governing cardiac function, including adenosinergic, adrenergic, angiotensin, growth factor, mineralocorticoid, and SGLT2 receptors, as well as the influences of ageing, diabetes, hypertension, exercise, influenza, and sepsis on cardiovascular physiology. Current projects investigate diastolic dysfunction through interactions between cardiac cells, structural membrane proteins like caveolae and cavins, and nitric oxide signalling, and the role of growth factor receptors such as ErbB4 in regulating neonatal cardiac structure and function to protect against heart failure with preserved ejection fraction.

Reichelt's laboratory employs gene editing and in-house designed viruses to control receptor and ligand expression in specific cardiac cell subtypes, spanning single-cell studies, isolated heart function, and intact heart assessments. She is funded by two Australian Research Council Discovery Project grants—DP200101152 (2020-2022) on cardiac stiffness in ageing and DP190102072 (2019-2021) on angiotensin II generation—and led a 2019 Major Equipment Infrastructure Grant for the Vevo 3100 preclinical ultrasound machine, enabling cardiac function measurement in small animals including embryos in utero. Her work has been published in leading journals such as Circulation Research, Basic Research in Cardiology, Cardiovascular Research, Hypertension, Autophagy, and Scientific Reports. Notable publications include 'Therapeutic inhibition of acid sensing ion channel 1a recovers heart function after ischemia-reperfusion injury' (Redd et al., Circulation, 2021), 'Acid-sensing ion channel 1a blockade reduces myocardial injury in rodent models of myocardial infarction' (Redd et al., European Heart Journal, 2024), 'Periconceptional alcohol alters in vivo heart function in ageing female rat offspring: Possible involvement of oestrogen receptor signalling' (Dorey et al., Experimental Physiology, 2023), and 'Early cardiac aging linked to impaired stress-resistance and transcriptional control of stress response, quality control and mitochondrial pathways' (Ashton et al., Experimental Gerontology, 2023). Reichelt leads a team including postdoctoral researchers, a research assistant, and PhD and honours students, contributing to advancements in cardiovascular disease models including hypertension, ischemia, diabetes, ageing, and cardiotoxicity from cancer therapies.

Professional Email: m.reichelt@uq.edu.au