Rate My Professor Rebecca Vanders

Dr Rebecca Vanders is a Post-Doctoral Research Fellow in the School of Biomedical Sciences and Pharmacy, College of Health, Medicine and Wellbeing, at the University of Newcastle. She earned her PhD in Medicine from the University of Newcastle in 2013, supported by an Australian Postgraduate Award scholarship, and received the Vice Chancellor’s Award for Academic Excellence and second place in the Three Minute Thesis competition that year. Prior degrees include a Bachelor of Biomedical Sciences (Honours Class I) from the University of New England in 2008 and a Bachelor of Science from the same university. Vanders' research specializations encompass cellular immunology, with a focus on maternal health challenges such as infertility from endometriosis and polycystic ovary syndrome, cigarette smoking effects during pregnancy, maternal immune system alterations, respiratory virus infections including influenza, immune checkpoints, antiviral immunity, asthma in pregnancy, and innovative treatments for pregnant women and their offspring.

Her career includes NHMRC Early Career Research Fellowships since 2016 and TSANZ Astra Zeneca Early Career Research Fellowships from 2013 to 2015, both within the Priority Research Centre for Healthy Lungs at the University of Newcastle. She has attracted over $2.6 million in grants, notably as Lead on a NHMRC MRFF project (2025-2029 worth $2,036,673). Key publications feature "Immune checkpoints are suppressed during pregnancy following influenza A virus infection" (2024, American Journal of Physiology-Lung Cellular and Molecular Physiology), "Inflammatory and antiviral responses to influenza A virus infection are dysregulated in pregnant mice with allergic airway disease" (2023, same journal), "Nasal epithelial cells to assess in vitro immune responses to respiratory virus infection in pregnant women with asthma" (2019, Respiratory Research), "CD8 T cells and dendritic cells: key players in the attenuated maternal immune response to influenza infection" (2015, Journal of Reproductive Immunology), and "Plasmacytoid dendritic cells and CD8 T cells from pregnant women show altered phenotype and function following H1N1/09 infection" (2013, Journal of Infectious Diseases). Vanders has presented at international conferences like the American Thoracic Society, participated in media interviews, and co-supervised a PhD on pregnancy smoke exposure effects.