Professor Matthew Cooper is CEO of Inflazome Ltd. and has an equity interest in the company of which UQ is also a shareholder through its commercialisation company UniQuest Pty. Ltd. Inflazome Ltd. is a company headquartered in Dublin, Ireland that is developing drugs to address clinical unmet needs in inflammatory disease by targeting the inflammasome. Professor Cooper also holds a fractional Professorial Research Fellow appointment at the University of Queensland. The terms of this arrangement have been reviewed and approved by the University of Queensland, in accordance with its conflict of interest policies.
Matt Cooper completed his PhD in Australia in 1995 and then spent 13 years in the UK, first at the University of Cambridge, then in start-ups and biotechnology companies. This involved innovation, fund raising, intellectual property generation, licensing, product development and commercialisation.
He returned to Australia in 2009 as a NHMRC Australia Fellow and is now a NHMRC Principal Research Fellow. He has consulted with Private Equity Investment, Pharmaceutical, Biotechnology and Diagnostics companies, was Managing Director of Cambridge Medical Innovations (part of Alere Inc.) and CSO of Akubio Ltd. He is an inventor and driver of a several antibiotic drug discovery programmes with lead compounds pre-clinical. He is an expert in label-free technologies and their application to drug discovery and development with two books in this field.
Academic Qualifications
1992-1994 Ph.D in Organic Chemistry, University of Adelaide, Australia.
1986-1989 B.Sc and Honours Degree (1st Class), University of Adelaide, Australia.
Prizes and Awards
2016 Adjunct Professor, School of Biochemistry and Immunology, Trinity College Dublin
2014 NHMRC Principal Research Fellow
2014 Medal for Excellence, Journal of Antibiotics
2013 NHMRC Nationally Top Ranked Development Grant Award (2013)
2013 Australian Society for Antimicrobials - Howard Florey Oration
2008 NHMRC Australia Fellow.
2007 Institution of Engineering and Technology Award for Emerging Technologies.
2006 Dept. Trade & Industry Micro and Nanotechnology Innovation Award, UK.
2005 Entrepreneur of the Year Finalist, UK.
2003 Trinity College Cambridge Support Scheme Award, UK.
2002 Dept. Trade & Industry Smart Innovation Award, UK.
1999 Howard Florey Centenary Research Fellowship.
1995 George Murray Fellowship at the University of Cambridge, UK.
Professional Affiliations
Pfizer Australia Stakeholder Faculty
Fellow of the Queensland Academy of Arts and Sciences
Fellow of the Royal Society of Medicine
Member of the Royal Australian Society of Chemistry
Australian Society for Infectious Diseases
Australian Society for Antimicrobials
Invited Conference Presentations
Gordon Research Conference on Multidrug Efflux Systems, Galveston, Texas, 26-31 March, 2017
Grand Challenges Annual Meeting 2016, London, England, 23 - 26 October 2016
ESCMID-ASM Conference on Drug Development to Meet the Challenge of Antimicrobial Resistance, Vienna, Austria, 21 – 23 September 2016
BIO 2016, San Francisco, USA, 6-10 June 2016 (2 presentations)
Elected Vice Chair of the GRC New Antibacterial Discovery & Development Conference
GRC New Antibacterial Discover & Development Conference, Tuscany, Italy, 13–18 March 2016
International Chemical Congress of the Pacific Basin Societies (Pacifichem), Honolulu, Hawaii,
15–20 December 2015
Centre for Biodiscovery Symposium – Invited Plenary Lecture, Wellington, New Zealand,
24–25 November 2015
2nd International Conference on Polymyxins, San Diego, USA, 22-24 September 2015
MedChem2015 Conference, Novosibirsk, Russia, 2015
GRC Antimicrobial Peptides, Italy, 2015
ECCMID - European Society of Clinical Microbiology & Infectious Diseases, Copenhagen, 2015
111th International Titisee conference “Rediscovering Warbug –the role of metabolism in signalling disease”, Titisee, Black Forest, Germany 2015
ICAAC - Interscience Conference on Antimicrobial Agents & Chemotherapy, Washington, USA, 2014
24th World Congress on Biosensors, Melbourne, Australia, 2014
ECCMID - European Society of Clinical Microbiology & Infectious Diseases, Barcelona, Spain, 2014
5th FIP Pharmaceutical Science World Conference, Melbourne, Australia, 2014
GRC New Antibacterials Discovery & Development, Ventura, USA, 2014
10th Australian Peptide Conference, Penang, Malaysia, 2013
ASID Gram Negative 'Superbugs' meeting, Gold Coast, Australia, 2013
ASM Conference, Adelaide, Australia, 2013
Bioeconomy China China 2013
2013 International NanoMedicine Conference, Sydney, Australia, 2013
AusMedTech conference, Melbourne, Australia, 2013
Plenary speaker presenting the inaugural "Howard Florey Oration", ASA Antimicrobials 2013, Sydney, Australia, 2013
1st International Conference on BioNano Innovation, Brisbane, Australia, 2012
Label-free Symposium, Brisbane, Australia, 2012
Plenary speaker at the International Conference on Biotechnology, Bogor, Indonesia, 2012
CASB IMB Industry Symposium, Brisbane, Australia, 2012
UQ Senior Executive Mission to Indonesia, Jakarta, Indonesia, 2012
Gordon Research Conference: New Antibacterial Discovery & Development, Italy, 2012
Australian Society for Infectious Diseases Annual Scientific Meeting, Fremantle, Australia, 2012
RACI Annual Dinner and AGM, Brisbane, Australia 2012
Emerging Infectious Diseases and bioinformatics Symposium, Singapore, 2012
Lorne Infection & Immunity, Melbourne, Australia, 2012
Screening Asia Conference, Singapore, 2011
CASB IMB Industry Symposium & Anti-Infectives Satellite Meeting, Brisbane, Australia, 2011
International Tuberculosis Research Centre, Masan, Korea, 2011
9th International Symposium on Multi Drug-Resistant Tuberculosis, Osong, Korea, 2011
Gordon Research Conference – Tuberculosis Drug Development, Barga, Italy, 2011
Eskitis Institute, Griffith University, Brisbane, Australia, 2011
Monash University, School of Chemistry, Melbourne, Australia, 2011
Monash University, Monash Institute of Pharmaceutical Science, Melbourne Australia, 2011
British Society Antimicrobial Chemotherapy Spring Meeting, London, UK, 2011
CASB IMB Industry Symposium, Brisbane, Australia, 2010
Developments in Protein Interaction Analysis, Barcelona, Spain, 2010
Australian Institute for Bioengineering & Nanotechnology Symposium, Brisbane, Australia, 2010
Royal Australian Society of Chemistry National Conference, Melbourne, Australia, 2010
Queensland Washington Global Health Symposium, Seattle, USA, 2010
LCN UCL Cantilever Workshop, Zermatt, Switzerland, 2010
Australian Toll-like Receptors, Gold Coast, Australia, 2009
8th Australian Peptide Conference, Couran Cove, Australia, 2009
University of Queensland Research Week Public Lecture, Brisbane, Australia, 2009
Sensor and Test, Nuremburg, Germany, 2009
American Association of Pharmaceutical Scientists National Conference, Seattle, USA, 2009
Advances in Biosensors for Point of Care Applications, London, UK, 2009
BioAnalytical Method Development, San Francisco, USA, 2008
Gordon Research Conference on Bioanalytical Sensor, Smithfield, USA, 2008
Plenary Speaker Nanomechanical Sensors for Biological Applications, Copenhagen, Denmark, 2008
Co-Chair, Society for Biomolecular Science European Symposium, Dresden, 2008
Biosecurity Sensors & Instrumentation, London, UK, 2007
ERBI’s 9th Annual Cambridge BioPartnering Exchange, Cambridge, UK, 2007
10th MipTech Conference, Basel, Switzerland, 2007
Gordon Research Conference on Chemical Sensors & Interfacial Design, Newport, USA, 2007
2nd IET Seminar on Micro/Nanotechnology in Medicine, London, UK, 2006
12th Annual Society for Biomolecular Science, Seattle, USA, 2006
ScreenTech World Summit, San Diego, USA, 2006
IEE Micro and Nanotechnology in Medicine, London, UK, 2006
LabAutomation, Palm Springs, USA, 2006
Biosensing technologies for medical and homeland security applications, London, UK, 2006
Measurement and Characterisation of Medical Biosensors, London, UK, 2005
AACC Oak Ridge: Pushing the Technology Envelope II, Baltimore, USA, 2005
Separation, Purification and Analysis in Drug Discovery, Göteborg, Sweden, 2004
ScreenTech World Summit, San Diego, USA, 2004
9th Annual Society for Biomolecular Screening Conference, Portland, USA, 2003
Gordon Research Conference on Chemical Sensors & Interfacial Design, Newport, USA, 2003
15th International Affinity Interactions Conference, Cambridge, UK, 2003
Nanotech Biotech Convergence, Stamford, USA, 2003
IEEE Sensors 2002, Orlando, USA, 2002
World BIAsympoisum, Chicago, USA, 2002
8th Annual Society for Biomolecular Screening Conference, Baltimore, USA, 2001
3rd Australian BIAsymposium, Brisbane, Australia, 2000
4th 2D gel electrophoresis meeting, Siena, Italy, 2000
18th International Congress of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Birmingham, UK, 2000
International Workshop on Biosensors Utilizing Lipid Bilayer Membranes, Mainz, Germany, 1999
US/European BIAsymposium, Edinburgh, Scotland, 1998
Reversible Associations in Structural and Molecular Biology, Melbourne, Australia, 1998
Weak Affinity Interactions Symposium, Stevenage, UK, 1997
European BIAsymposium, Montpellier, France, 1996
US BIAsymposium, Washington, USA, 1996
IBC Drug Discovery Technology Symposium, Boston, USA, 1996
RACI 10th National Conference, University of Wollongong, Australia, 1994
Organic Chemistry Symposium, Victor Harbour, Australia, 1993
RACI, 9th National Conference, Monash University, Melbourne, Australia, 1992