Jennifer Helen Martin is an Australian clinical pharmacologist, physician and academic. She is chair of Clinical Pharmacology in the

University of Newcastle School of Medicine and Public Health The University of Newcastle School of Medicine, located at the University of Newcastle, is one of only eight medical schools in Australia that offers an undergraduate medical degree, and is the shortest undergraduate medical degree offered at ...

, Director of the

NHMRC The National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) is the main statutory authority of the Australian Government responsible for medical research. It was the eighth largest research funding body in the world in 2016, and NHMRC-funded res ...

funded Australian Centre for Cannabinoid Clinical and Research Excellence (ACRE), and an elected a Fellow of the

Australian Academy of Health and Medical Sciences The Australian Academy of Health and Medical Sciences is an academy to promote health and medical sciences in Australia. It was established in June 2014. It cites "The Academy will serve the three purposes identified as of high priority in the 20 ...

. Martin translates research into practice and policy. Her research involves the investigation of therapeutic drugs, from drug design and development, to clinical trials and studies to investigate how new drugs perform in the general population.

Early life

Martin grew up in Wellington, New Zealand where she followed an early interest in medicine from her love of sport, hoping to one day be the doctor who travelled with the New Zealand Olympic team. After studying medicine at the University of Otago, moved to work and study in the United Kingdom in 1993, later returning to New Zealand to train as a specialist in pharmacology and internal medicine. Martin moved to Melbourne to undertake a PhD in Medicine in 2000.

Career

Martin was a Rhodes Scholar who has studied politics and health economics at the University of Oxford. She completed a Bachelor of Medicine and Surgery from the University of Otago and a Doctor of Philosophy at Monash University in 2005, examining innate immunity and heart failure

pathophysiology Pathophysiology ( physiopathology) – a convergence of pathology with physiology – is the study of the disordered physiological processes that cause, result from, or are otherwise associated with a disease or injury. Pathology is the ...

in people with type 2 diabetes. Her post-doctoral work investigated

macrophage Macrophages (abbreviated as M φ, MΦ or MP) ( el, large eaters, from Greek ''μακρός'' (') = large, ''φαγεῖν'' (') = to eat) are a type of white blood cell of the immune system that engulfs and digests pathogens, such as cancer cel ...

function in high fat diet at the

Walter and Eliza Hall Institute WEHI (), previously known as the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research, and as the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute, is Australia's oldest medical research research institute, institute. Sir Frank Macfarlane Burnet, who won the Nobe ...

. Following her post-doctoral studies, Martin became the Head of Southside Clinical School at the University of Queensland where she was involved in revising the medical curricula to broaden medical student experiences in healthcare. Martin took on the leadership position of Chair of Clinical Pharmacology at the University of Newcastle in 2013. Martin was elected a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Health and Medical Sciences in 2020. In the same year she published a report of clinical trials in Australia of using increasingly legal medicines based on cannabis. The report gave advice on ethics and keeping patients safe.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Martin, Jennifer Living people Year of birth missing (living people) Australian pharmacologists Fellows of the Australian Academy of Health and Medical Sciences University of Otago alumni Monash University alumni University of Queensland faculty University of Newcastle (Australia) faculty New Zealand Rhodes Scholars New Zealand expatriates in Australia