Prof Katharina Ronacher

Professor Katharina Ronacher is a Principal Research Fellow at Mater Research where she leads the Infection, Immunity and Metabolism Research Group.

Katharina’s lab investigates the immune-endocrine connection between type 2 diabetes and infectious diseases, in particular tuberculosis. Her area of research has attracted worldwide interest largely due to the threat of a resurgence in tuberculosis with increasing prevalence of diabetes—The World Health Organization (WHO), the International Union against Tuberculosis and Lung Disease and the World Diabetes Foundation, since 2011, have called for global action on this topic.

Katharina has successfully obtained national funding in South Africa on a regular basis since 2008, and in 2015, she received a 5 years grant from the National Institute of Health (NIH, USA) as Principal Investigator to further investigate the underlying immune-endocrine mechanisms of the increased risk of tuberculosis in patients with type 2 diabetes. She continues to hold an appointment as an Extraordinary Associate Professor at Stellenbosch University in South Africa where she still has a team of four researchers.

Katharina completed her undergraduate degree and MSc from the University of Vienna, Austria, before completing a PhD at the University of Cape Town, South Africa. After her post-doctoral training at Stellenbosch University in molecular endocrinology, she accepted a faculty position at the same university where she has been working for over 10 years on tuberculosis biomarkers and immune-endocrine interactions in the context of tuberculosis. She has been senior scientist on large clinical research trials funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the European Union, which resulted in her extensive experience in clinical research trial management. In 2022, Katharina was promoted to Professor at Mater Research/MRI-UQ

“I started my research career studying hormones and their receptors and then moved into infectious disease immunology, only to discover how tightly the immune and the endocrine systems are connected. I am fascinated by the miraculous complexity of the human body and have a passion for interdisciplinary research ultimately leading to improved treatments for patients. My priority is to spark this interest in post-graduate students and teach them how to “think out of the box”.”