Dr Stuti Misra

Dr Stuti Misra, a senior lecturer with the ophthalmology department at the University of Auckland, has been awarded three grants from the Health Research Council of New Zealand (HRC), including the prestigious Sir Charles Hercus health research fellowship.

Presented to scientists demonstrating outstanding potential to become highly skilled researchers able to initiate new avenues of investigation, the Hercus fellowship is highly coveted, said Dr Misra. “When I submitted three grant applications, I hoped to be successful in at least one, but being awarded all three is truly humbling,” she said, adding the awards recognise her department’s pioneering ocular research.

The Hercus grant will support Dr Misra’s study on the effects of diabetes on the ocular surface in a paediatric population. “Diabetes has an immeasurable impact on a child’s physical, mental and financial wellbeing, primarily due to delayed diagnosis of debilitating irreversible complications,” she said. The research aims to understand corneal nerve microstructure in youngsters with and without diabetes. “This will help diagnose and monitor the disease using an alternate pathway for early detection, so that timely treatment can be administered,” she explained.

The other two grants were awarded to Dr Joevy Lim, to complete her PhD on melanocytic lesions of the eye under the supervision of department head Professor Charles McGhee together with Drs Misra and Akilesh Gokul; and Ricki Steiner-Taepa for her Māori summer studentship project, with Dr Misra as associate investigator.

In other department news, senior lecturers Drs Jay Meyer and Mo Ziaei plus lecturer Dr Gokul have been made permanent appointments, while Dr Joyce Mathan completed her doctoral thesis on keratoconus in Down syndrome.