Eleanor McLean - Awarded highest achieving BMedSc(Hons) student, 2025
Eleanor McLean, highest achieving BMedSc(Hons) student, 2025
Congratulations to Eleanor McLean, who was the highest achieving student for 2025 in the Bachelor of Medical Science (Honours). The program is a one-year degree available to medical students and graduates that embeds students in a research setting with Australian and internationally recognised researchers.
Eleanor was embedded in the Next Generation Precision Medicine Program at the Hudson Institute of Medical Research. Eleanor's research aimed to support the development of safer, more effective, and targeted therapies for childhood cancers. Current treatments often cause significant long-term side effects, and many childhood cancers still lack effective therapeutic options.
Eleanor's honours thesis, titled ‘Proteomic Identification of Targets for Antibody-Drug Conjugates in Paediatric Cancers’, focused on identifying cell surface proteins that could be targeted using antibody–drug conjugates (ADCs). ADCs are antibodies linked to highly potent chemotherapy agents, enabling selective delivery of toxic drugs directly into cancer cells while minimising damage to healthy tissue. Eleanor and team analysed whole-cell proteomic data to identify proteins expressed within cells, then filtered for those known to be located on the cell surface. Protein expression levels in cancerous cells were compared with those in non-cancerous cells to identify cancer-specific targets.
Eleanor examined chordoma, a rare subtype of sarcoma that occurs in the base of the skull or the spine. Currently, treatment options for chordoma are limited to surgery and radiotherapy. Using chordoma cell line models, Eleanor's research identified a promising cell surface target and demonstrated that cells expressing this protein could be selectively killed using ADCs.
Although these findings are preliminary, they provide important proof-of-concept evidence. Eleanor hopes that, in the future, ADC-based therapies may offer an additional treatment option for patients with chordoma.
“I am honoured to be recognised for my work during my BMedSc(Hons) year. I am grateful to my supervisors Professor Ron Firestein and Dr Paul Daniel, whose mentorship and support made this achievement possible", Eleanor said.
About Monash University
Monash University is Australia’s largest university with more than 80,000 students. In the 60 years since its foundation, it has developed a reputation for world-leading high-impact research, quality teaching, and inspiring innovation.
With four campuses in Australia and a presence in Malaysia, China, India, Indonesia and Italy, it is one of the most internationalised Australian universities.
As a leading international medical research university with the largest medical faculty in Australia and integration with leading Australian teaching hospitals, we consistently rank in the top 50 universities worldwide for clinical, pre-clinical and health sciences.
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