Our team

Professor Michelle McIntosh - Director

Professor Michelle McIntosh

Director

Michelle has 20 years experience as a pharmaceutical scientist specialising in drug delivery system innovations; analytical chromatography techniques; pharmaceutical product commercialisation; characterisation and development of prodrug technologies; cyclodextrin-enabled formulations for poorly water soluble compounds; subcutaneous delivery of monoclonal antibodies and development of dry powder inhaled delivery systems.

Find out more

michelle.mcintosh@monash.edu

Dr David Rudd 

Dr David Rudd

Laboratory Manager

Dr Rudd is an analytical chemist specialising in spectroscopic identification, mapping drug distribution by mass spectrometry imaging, and compound characterisation including stability and formulation approaches.

He has diverse experience in method development using highly specialised and standard analytical instruments, including a variety of mass spectrometers to analyse the way small and large molecule drugs target different organs and evaluate drug disposition in tissues, generating PK/PD parameters and informing dosing strategies.

Additionally, Dr Rudd is a research fellow at the Melbourne Centre for Nanofabrication where he practises interfacing nanofabricated materials with analytical chemistry, for ultrasensitive detection of drugs and their metabolites. He has also helped found a company to perform rapid and high throughput illicit drug testing in humans.

Dr Rudd has a PhD in natural product chemistry from Flinders University where his research investigated novel anti-inflammatory and anti-cancer compounds found in marine molluscs. It was during these studies that David gained a strong foundation of laboratory skills in high-level instrumentation.

Specialty areas:

  • Mass Spectrometry imaging
  • Drug disposition studies
  • Biologics characterisation (top-down/bottom-up)
  • Small molecule characterisation
  • Preclinical assay development (stability/formulation)
  • Metabolomics/proteomics
  • Biomarker discovery
  • Nanomaterials fabrication/characterisation
  • Natural product discovery
  • A variety of analytical facilities including: 
    • Matrix-Assisted Laser Desorption/ Ionization Time-of-Flight Mass Spectrometry (MALDI-TOF MS)
    • Time-of-Flight (TOF) Mass Spectrometry (MS) instruments with ESI (electrospray ionisation) and APCI (Atmospheric Pressure Chemical Ionization)
    • Gas chromatography/ liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC/LC-MS)

.david.rudd@monash.edu

Dr Julia Morizzi - Senior Research Officer 

Dr Julia Morizzi

Senior Research Officer

Julia has been employed at MIPS for a number of years and has over 10 years’ experience in the early drug discovery area. Her major focus had been LCMS analyses of small drug candidates to determine their pharmacokinetic and metabolic properties. She has also been involved in establishing quality management systems for ISO certification.

Dr Claire McEvoy - Research Officer 

Dr Claire McEvoy

Research Officer and
Business Operations

Claire joined Monash University in 2006. Her PhD in Biopharmaceutics evaluated the solubilisation properties and pharmacokinetics of poorly water soluble drugs after oral administration in lipid-based drug delivery systems. Claire has previously worked on stability and bioanalysis of oxytocin and has since focused on LCMS bioanalysis of small molecule compounds.

Joseph Pelle - Laboratory Technician and Training Specialist 

Joseph Pelle

Laboratory Technician and Training Specialist

Joseph has worked in an analytical teaching laboratory and as a senior instrumental technical officer in the university sector for 17 years. Joseph has a background in analytical chemistry and is experienced in using a range of analytical instruments for food and chemical analysis. Joseph provides training to higher degree research students on GC, GCMS, HPLC, LCMS, FTIR, Fluorescence, AAS and ICP instruments. He has a strong background in method development and trouble-shooting and is highly experienced in repairing and performing maintenance checks on scientific instruments.