Christchurch medical student and PhD candidate Thomas Pirker receiving the Ralph Reader Prize in the Basic Science category from Cardiac Society of Australia and New Zealand (CSANZ) President Dr Mayanna Lund.
A Christchurch medical student and PhD candidate has won a prestigious award at the recent Cardiac Society of Australia and New Zealand (CSANZ) conference in Brisbane.
Thomas Pirker is the first New Zealander to receive the coveted Ralph Reader Prize in the Basic Science category at the annual CSANZ awards for his work studying a protein called suPAR and its actions on the heart when blood flow is restored following a heart attack.
Currently in the 4th year of his medical degree and the 3rd year of his PhD within the Department of Medicine’s Christchurch Heart Institute (CHI), Thomas says it was quite an acknowledgement to be chosen as a finalist in the Basic Science category, let alone to win it.
“When my name was called, I felt a mixture of relief and excitement, and afterwards, I just felt extremely proud – both of myself and of the team who helped me get there,” Thomas says.
“I am hugely thankful to my primary supervisor Dr Janice Chew-Harris, who really encouraged me to put myself forward for the award, and for the support of the wider CHI team who helped me thoroughly prepare, practise, and refine my presentation leading up to the event.”
Throughout his PhD thesis, Thomas has explored how suPAR may function across several different levels, from its effects on mitochondria, to biochemical signalling pathways, and in ex vivo models of cardiac ischaemia-reperfusion injury – linking this to the team’s new in vivo model.
“When a blocked artery is reopened following a heart attack, some of the returning blood flow can cause further injury, so my research focuses on how suPAR may be involved in that process,” he explains.
Thomas, who attended Shirley Boys High School in Christchurch, discovered a passion for research while completing a summer studentship in the Jones Lab at Heart Otago in Dunedin after being accepted for Otago Medical School the previous year.
He says this experience led to his first medical conference in Queenstown, before a shift back home to Christchurch in 2023 to begin his BMedSci (Hons) under the supervision of both Janice and the CHI’s Professor Chris Pemberton.
Later that year he was awarded the A.H Couch Scholarship from the National Heart Foundation of New Zealand. This facilitated the upgrade of his Honours project to a doctoral programme, expanding the aims of his thesis to develop a new preclinical model to study the role of suPAR in heart disease.
Otago PhD candidate Jaya Montecillo, Thomas Pirker, and his PhD Supervisor Dr Janice Chew-Harris at the CSANZ 2025 awards in Brisbane.
This change led to CHI cardiologist Associate Professor Phil Adamson becoming a member of his doctoral thesis supervisory team.
Thomas was also honoured to win the CSANZ’s Young Investigator Award in 2023. In early 2024, he spent six weeks in Auckland at the Bioengineering Institute under the supervision of Dr Toan Pham, assessing whether suPAR may have effects on subcellular cardiac mitochondria.
Last August he “was very excited” to present some of his earlier results at the European Society of Cardiology meeting in London.
“My journey as an intercalated PhD and medical student has been, and continues to be, a rewarding experience, and I’m extremely grateful for all the opportunities and enormous support I’ve received,” Thomas says.
“Medical research has always felt like an important part of my future career, and I see it as something that will stay with me throughout my work as a clinician. I believe research is a key part of being a good doctor – it keeps you curious, helps you think critically, and ultimately improves the care you can provide to patients.”
– Kōrero by Lorelei Mason
Rangahau Manawa o Ōtautahi
The Christchurch Heart Institute is working to reduce Cardiovascular disease, which causes 30% of all early deaths in New Zealand.
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