Amazing Researchers
At the University of Auckland, our passion is to make a difference to our society, and the world. Our academics and researchers never stop breaking boundaries. We've profiled two of our leading researchers, Professor Christian Hartinger and Professor Tracey McIntosh, to showcase the difference they are making to New Zealand society, and globally.
Professor Christian Hartinger
Professor Christian Hartinger is a leading researcher in the fields of medicinal bioinorganic, bioanalytical and bioorganometallic chemistry and is particularly known for his work on the development of metal-based anticancer drugs.
His work has significantly improved our understanding of the behaviour of metal-based anticancer agents in biological systems at the molecular level. DNA-targeted metal compounds have been used for decades as a standard cancer treatment against a wide variety of cancer types.
While organic compounds continue to dominate medicinal chemistry, inorganic metallodrugs are an exciting new frontier because metal compounds have specific properties that allow the development of new treatments that can target cancer cells much more narrowly.
This is the goal of Professor Hartinger's research. His group develops therapeutics that help to improve the selectivity of anticancer drugs for tumours by improving their accumulation or by targeting differences between healthy and tumour cells.
Professor Hartinger, from the University's School of Chemical Sciences, is also an Associate Investigator at the Maurice Wilkins Centre for Molecular Biodiscovery.
Read more about Professor Hartinger's research.
Professor Tracey McIntosh
Tracey McIntosh, Professor of Indigenous Studies at the University of Auckland, and co-head of the University's Te Wānanga o Waipapa (School of Maori and Pacific Studies) is known for her ground-breaking work in advancing our understanding of the enduring social injustices that undermine Māori wellbeing.
Her research looks at how to correct the intergenerational transmission of social inequalities, particularly how they relate to Māori. She focuses on the incarceration of Māori women and on male ex-prisoners with gang affiliations and highlights the relationship between imprisonment, which socially excludes Māori, and the reproduction of ethnic and class disparities and intergenerational inequality.
Professor McIntosh's work has three central pillars: education and creative writing in prisons; the intergenerational transfer of social inequalities and government, community and whanau-based responses; and evidence-informed policy and advice.
Professor McIntosh, was recently honoured by the New Zealand Royal Society Te Apārangi with the 2017 Te Rangi Hiroa Medal for Social Sciences.
Read more about Professor McIntosh's research.