Associate Professor Hsin-Hui Shen

AMR IMPACT THEME
  • AMR Therapeutic Solutions
EXPERTISE
  • Antimicrobial Materials and Drug Delivery
  • Mechanistic Analysis of Bacterial Membrane Interactions
  • Nanomaterials Engineering for Drug and Antimicrobial Delivery

Hsin-Hui Shen is an expert in antimicrobial materials, nanomedicine, and targeted drug delivery. Her research focuses on engineering advanced nanomaterials to enhance the delivery and efficacy of antimicrobial agents, particularly against drug-resistant pathogens. By uncovering how these agents interact with and disrupt bacterial membranes, she bridges materials science and microbiology to develop next-generation strategies that combat antimicrobial resistance. Dr. Shen holds a joint appointment in the Faculty of Engineering (Materials Science and Engineering) and the Faculty of Medicine (Biomedicine Discovery Institute) at Monash University. She completed her PhD at the University of Oxford in 2008, followed by postdoctoral research at CSIRO and prestigious fellowships including the ARC Super Science Fellowship and NHMRC Career Development Fellowship.

Internationally recognised for her expertise in bio-neutron techniques and bacterial membrane biology, Dr. Shen leads innovative research on the mechanisms of antimicrobial resistance and the interplay between resistance and virulence. Her work has pioneered the use of neutron scattering to probe nanoantibiotic-membrane interactions and the physicochemical properties of biomolecules in bacterial model membranes. Her contributions are reflected in high-impact publications in Science, PNAS, Nature Microbiology, Nature Communications, Biomaterials, and Advanced Materials, establishing her as a leader in the field.

AMR FOCUS
  • Mechanistic studies of membrane-related antimicrobial resistance
  • Nanoscale delivery systems using lipids and polymers for transporting antimicrobial agents.
  • Nanoantibiotic–antibiotic combination therapies
  • Bio-neutron imaging of antibiotic–membrane interactions
IMPACT
  • Developed advanced lipid-based nanocarriers that restore the potency of antibiotics against multidrug-resistant bacteria, enabling more effective treatment strategies for otherwise untreatable infections.
  • Pioneered the application of bio-neutron scattering to uncover membrane-level mechanisms of antimicrobial resistance, providing critical insights into how pathogens evade last-line antibiotics.
  • Enabled the rational design of non-antibiotic–antibiotic combination therapies through mechanistic studies, informing both therapeutic development and broader antimicrobial resistance policy strategies.