Dr Gina Ravenscroft is a Senior Research Fellow at the University of Western Australia and Group Leader of the Rare Disease Genetics and Functional Genomics group at the Harry Perkins Institute of Medical Research. She completed her undergraduate studies majoring in physiology at UWA and obtained her PhD from the same university in 2009. Her PhD studies were within Prof Nigel Laing AO Neuromuscular Diseases Group and focused on charactering mouse models of actin-based nemaline myopathies and exploring gene therapies. In her postdoctoral training she transitioned into human genetics research and in particular identification and characterisation of novel neuromuscular disease genes. Dr Ravenscroft has been awarded a number of accolades in recognition of her research excellence, including World Muscle Society Young Myologist of the Year (2016), AIPS Young Tall Poppy Award (2016), BusinessNews 40under40 and Intrapreneur of the Year (2021) and the Lorne Genome Mid-Career Researcher Award (2022). She is currently supported by an NHMRC Emerging Leader 2 Investigator Grant and has been awarded more than $10M in competitive grant funding. He research is highly collaborative and spans understanding of fundamental biology and development, through to improved genetic diagnosis for patients with neuromuscular and other rare diseases. Dr Ravenscroft works closely with Dr Mark Davis and the Neurogenetic Unit he leads within Diagnostic Genomics, PathWest, an Australasian Referral Centre for genetic diagnosis of neuromuscular diseases.
