We’re helping to build a healthier and more sustainable world

The School of Life Sciences brings together a vibrant research and teaching culture with a diversity of interests in the area of biomedical research, sustainability and ecosystem health and life sciences technologies.

It's our goal that the work we do, the way we do it, the decisions we make and the way we communicate are underpinned by our core values:

  • Contribution. Aligned with the role of UTS as a public university, we are clear in our responsibility to contribute to society independently and with integrity.
  • Purpose. We are united in our passion for making a positive difference to the world. We achieve this by generating new knowledge through our research discoveries and through teaching others.
  • Creativity. We recognise the importance of being open to new challenges and their associated risk, being flexible in our approach change and learning from our mistakes.
  • Cooperation. We collaborate in our work, contributing to the achievements of our colleagues and students. Respect. We embrace diversity—our workplace culture is one where all staff and students are valued equally and feel safe at work; we care about others’ wellbeing and communicate with respect.

We are a strong, collegial and internationally renowned team of scientists.

Our research themes

Our researchers explore a vast array of scientific programs from climate change to environmental management, infectious diseases, bacteriology, parasitology to diabetes, cancer research and medical diagnostics and devices. It broadly spans three themes:

Healthy futures

Our research in biomedical and molecular research is underpinned by our aims to ensure we all enjoy a healthy life. Research ranges from the molecular to the human body, from fundamental biological processes to finding new treatments for diseases. 

Environmental Sciences

The team of environmental scientists in the School of Life Sciences work to provide sustainable solutions to real-world environmental problems. Their expertise spans flora and fauna across terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems, with their research targeting climate change, environmental interactions with human health and the conservation of biodiversity.

Life Sciences Technologies

Our research aims to develop new technologies and tools that help us understand the human body, diagnose or treat diseases and enable the next generation of pharmaceutical and medical devices. 

 

Explore our research

Study with us

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Our Environment and Marine courses combine general science subjects with specialist study in areas such as aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems, plant physiology, biodiversity conservation, wildlife management and environmental protection, among others.

Blend science and technology to improve patient health outcomes in our world-class Medical Science programs.

Use the power of tech to transform human health. Our hands-on, practical courses are designed to give you the technical, theoretical and professional skills you need, whether you’re creating vaccines, identifying new diagnostics tools or preserving our precious biosecurity.

Our Food Science courses emphasise technology and innovation, helping you build hands-on skills to succeed. You’ll graduate ready to revolutionise our food systems, processes and production, creating a better, tastier world.

Fighting for the future of coral reefs

Groundbreaking research is revealing the secrets of 'super corals' and how their traits can be harnessed to create more resilient reefs. 

Read the full story

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How 'super corals' can give the Great Barrier Reef a fighting chance

How 'super corals' can give the Great Barrier Reef a fighting chance transcript

Dr Emma Camp, Associate Professor, School of Life Sciences

Duration 3min 13sec

The Great Barrier Reef has been declining in live coral since the 1980s, but we're seeing an increased frequency in intensity with the rate of coral loss. So we're seeing less corals on the reef, less diversity, and we're also seeing less ability of the corals to reproduce. So collectively, this leaves a dire threat for the Great Barrier Reef into the future.

Knowing the immense stress that corals have to contend with in the future, as scientists, we have to think what can we do to support their survival? And for me, it was asking, are there corals that already live in naturally hostile conditions so warm, acidic, low oxygen environments, the environments that we're predicting the ocean to have in the future.

And some car was already survived that naturally because of an environment that exists that has those conditions. So I set off to look at different environments, measure the conditions and actually found that mangrove lagoons, which are common habitats adjacent to coral reefs, have hot, acidic and low oxygen conditions. But they also have thriving coral communities. This was really interesting because how are these corals surviving under conditions more extreme than we're predicting in the year 2100, when we're seeing coral reefs die from lesser stressors. Finding these corals living within these extreme mangrove environments has been a breakthrough, because it gives us hope that some corals have the capacity to tolerate stress.

We are looking at the genetics of the corals to try and understand which genes upgrade related at certain times, and how that contributes tolerance to the coral. We also looking at things like the lipids and the metabolites of the coral, to see if there are specific indicators of stress or indicators of tolerance that we can try to target as biomarkers for resilience.

We're also looking at developing technology. So how can we improve our phenotyping capacity to make it high throughput but also cheaper so that local communities can access this technology. Because ultimately that's the goal that we can transfer that knowledge to people on the ground making a difference. Being on the reef and seeing a mass bleaching event first hand is devastating.

You know, we spend our careers trying to work to conserve reefs, we know these threats are real. We know that it's happening but to see that and with corals, when they bleach, it's really in your face. You know, this colorful system that's normally brightly colored. Lots of different life going on then turn white is really confronting but it's also very frustrating because we know what the problems are.

We need to address climate change. We need to ensure that we're reducing the stresses on our reefs, but then also stepping back and feeling motivated because we haven't lost all of our reefs yet. We know reefs can be resilient, and that's ultimately what motivates me to try and ensure that we have reefs for future generations.

News and events

News

A breakthrough in imaging technology promises to transform our understanding of the inner workings of living cells, and provide insights into a wide range of diseases.

News

As NASA prepares to send astronauts back to the moon for the first time in over 50 years, new research from the UTS has found that lunar dust is less harmful to human lung cells than previously feared, and significantly less toxic than common Earth-based air pollution.

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A new analysis of 200 studies demonstrates the behavioural and physiological impacts of bingeing.

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Biomedical engineer Dr Jiao Jiao Li is using the healing powers of stem cells to treat chronic diseases.

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