TRANSLATIONAL CARDIOLOGY RESEARCHER

Dr Daniel Donner is a Shine Foundation-funded Senior Research Fellow at the Baker Heart & Diabetes Institute and holds Honorary Research positions at the University of Melbourne, Monash University, and The Alfred Hospital. He leads a large team of accomplished senior researchers and technical officers. He supervises PhDs, Masters and Honours students, and is a passionate mentor of early career researchers and postdocs, and postgraduate and undergraduate students. He is the Head of the Translational Cardiology Research Group & Platform, and is Principal Investigator of eight Translational Research Programs. He is also a co-investigator of >60 continuing research collaborations internationally with both academic and industry partners. Dr Donner is a Member of the European Cardiology Society (ECS), the Endocrine Society, and the International Society for Heart Research (ISHR).

Dr Donner has published over 30 peer-reviewed articles in high-impact scientific journals, including Nature CVR, Cardiovascular Research and Circulation. Since 2019, Dr Daniel Donner has attracted over $7M in research funding, and was awarded the BHDI's John Funder Early Career Researcher Prize (2022) and Early Career Scientist Award (2021), and Values Awards for Scientific Excellence (2021), Scientific Integrity (2020) and Responsible Use of Funding (2019). He is also a recipient of the International Society for Heart Research's esteemed Early Career Investigator Prize. He has made live appearances on national and regional television, in the Australian Newspaper and on national ABC radio for his expertise in discussions around heart disease, health and globalised solutions to growing demands in healthcare, and has seen parts of his research into improving scientific rigour featured by the American Physiological Society.

During study of his Australian Postgraduate Award-supported PhD, Dan was awarded a National Commercialisation Training Scheme Scholarship and completed parallel study of a Graduate Certificate of Research Management (2011). Dr Donner has more recently completed Miller Foundation Development Grant-funded study of a Certificate in Leadership at Harvard Business School (2020). 

Prior to his research career, Dan's leadership of purpose-driven independent ventures saw him honoured as the School of Medical Science Alumni of the Year at Griffith University in 2016.

RESEARCH

Dr Daniel Donner has been involved in a rapidly growing number of medical research projects, including >60 medical research studies in collaborations across both academia and industry. He has presented his research at international conferences in major international cities including Dubai, Berlin, Beijing, Chicago, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide and Sydney and is a member of various medico-scientific societies and communities.

Dr Donner's areas of medical research expertise extend across the fields of: preclinical trials for cardiovascular indications, cardiovascular physiology (heart and blood vessels), endocrinology (hormones), obesity and metabolic disease, osteology, and genetics. In his multi-faceted role at the Baker Institute, his continuing involvement in research quality and integrity supports ongoing meta-research on scientific rigour, featured previously by the American Physiological Society.

Metrics last updated: December, 2023

EDUCATION

Dr Daniel Donner has completed three tertiary degrees and two tertiary certificates, including a Bachelor of Biomedical Science (2008), a Masters of Medical Research (2010) and a Graduate Certificate in Research Management (2011), Doctor of Philosophy (2015) and Certificate of Leadership (2020).

His Masters degree produced his first first-author scientific paper (DMM, 2011). Supported by an Australian Postgraduate Award to commence for his doctoral studies in 2011, Dan graduated with his PhD (Biomedical) in 2015, the thesis of which comprehensively described the cardiovascular and metabolic implications of sex hormone disruption in males and novel pharmaceutical alternatives to testosterone replacement (producing 4 additional first-author papers, and 1 book chapter).

In 2020, Dan was a recipient of the Baker Institute Miller Investigator Development Grant to undertake study of a post-graduate certificate in Leadership at Harvard University, completed in December that year.