Professor Greg Rice
PhD, BSc, Master of Health Administration, Graduate Diploma
of Management, Member of the Australian Institute of Company
Directors
Dr Rice is an NHMRC Principal Research Fellow and Deputy
Director (Translation) of The University of Queensland's Centre for
Clinical Research, Professor in the Department of Medicine, Monash
University; Chief Scientist of the Mercy Perinatal Research Centre,
Mercy Hospital for Women; Program Leader of the Ovcare National
Cancer Centre, and Chairman of HealthLinx Limited.
Dr Rice completed his undergraduate (BSc, H1, 1976) and
postgraduate (PhD, 1980) degrees at the University of Western
Australia. In 1981, he was awarded a CSIRO Postgraduate Studentship
to completed post doctoral studies in the Department of Medical
Physiology, University of Copenhagen, Denmark and subsequently at
the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Southwestern Medical
School, University of Texas, Dallas, Texas (1982-83) and Department
of Physiology, Monash University, Melbourne, Australia (1983-1994).
He has held continuous appointment within the NHMRC Career Awards
Program since 1989.
In 1989, Dr Rice completed a Graduate Diploma in Management. In
1990, he completed a Master of Health Administration at the Royal
Melbourne Institute of Technology, for which he was awarded the
Anthony Suleau Prize (an Australia-wide award for research in
business management), by the Australian College of Health Services
Executives.
In 1993, Dr Rice co-founded the Perinatal Research Centre at The
Royal Women's Hospital, Melbourne. This Centre focused on
clinically relevant issues associated with women's reproductive
health. He was a co-recipient of an Australian Food Industry
Innovation Award in 1998 for work on dietary phytoestrogens and a
Victorian Public Health Awards for Excellence and Innovation
Commendation for work on smoking cessation intervention during
pregnancy.
In 1997 as the founding Chief Scientist, Dr Rice established the
Mercy Perinatal Research Centre at the Mercy Hospital for Women.
This Centre focuses on developing diagnostics and new treatments
for the common complications of pregnancy and the newborn.
Dr Rice co-founded the Gynaecological Cancer Research Centre at The
Royal Women's Hospital, Melbourne with Profs Mark Baker and Michael
Quinn (1989). The mission of this research centre is to develop
early diagnostic tests for reproductive tract cancers and in
particular, ovarian cancer.
In 2005, he established the Translational Proteomics Laboratory
at the BakerIDI Heart and Diabetes Institute in Melbourne that was
involved in the development of protein and peptide profiling and
the identification of disease-specific molecular signatures.
He is immediate past President of the International Federation
of Placental Associations and past President, Vice President and
Treasurer of the Perinatal Society of Australia and New
Zealand.
Dr Rice is a founding Director and Chairman of HealthLinx
Limited, an ASX-listed company developing novel diagnostics and
therapeutics. The company's ovarian cancer diagnostics OvPlex™ was
recently chosen as the joint winner of the BioSpectrum Asia Pacific
Product of the year 2010. He is a member of the Australian
Institute of Company Directors and has published more than 180
scientific papers in peer-reviewed journals.
Research Projects
Assessing the risk of complications of
pregnancy: The aim of this project is to identify
blood-borne biomarkers that may be used at the first antenatal
visit to identify pre-symptomatic women who are at risk of
developing complications of pregnancy. Complications of
pregnancy, including preeclampsia, intrauterine growth restriction
and preterm birth represent the major causes of fetal and neonatal
morbidity and mortality and potentially affect childhood and adult
susceptibility to both cardiac and metabolic diseases. As
these complications of pregnancies are often not diagnosed and
clinically overt until third trimester, little opportunity is
afforded to implement preventative strategies that may ameliorate
their impact upon both mother and baby and long term health
outcomes. At present, the most important contribution that can be
made to improving the health outcome for pregnant women who develop
these complications and their babies is early detection - early
detection being a prerequisite to developing and evaluating
efficacious management and treatment.
What triggers birth? Each year in Australia
more than 250,000 babies are born. Of these, ~ 20,000 are delivered
preterm, 15,000 are born post-dates, 16,000 are born with low birth
weight (<2500g); 5,500 babies are admitted to level III neonatal
intensive care units and 2,500 babies died during the first 28 days
of life. The single most important complication contributing to
poor pregnancy and neonatal outcome is premature birth. Its
incidence has not changed in decades. If we are to realise the
National Research Priority of Providing the Best Possible Start to
Life then an understanding of the processes that regulate timely
labour onset and safe delivery is essential.
The aim of this project is to investigate the role of specific
nuclear regulatory factor pathways the initiation of labour and
delivery. There is now compelling evidence implicating
nuclear regulatory factors including, the nuclear factor-κB family
of nuclear transcription factors; the nuclear hormone receptor
superfamily of peroxisome proliferator activated receptors
and the steroid receptors for progesterone as candidate upstream
regulators of labour associated processes.
Predicting Preterm Labour: The principal
objective of this project is to develop and deliver a multivatiate
assay for the prediction and diagnosis of human preterm
labour. Through the successful application of our own
proteomic 2DE discovery programme using human cervico-vaginal fluid
samples, we have identified several new protein markers of labour.
Having completed Phase I biomarker discovery and established
proof-of-concept, this project focused on the conduct of a Phase II
biomarker trial to determine reliable estimates of assay
sensitivity and specificity of multiple biomarker panels.
How do membranes rupture? Preterm premature
rupture of fetal membranes (PPROM) is responsible for more than
one-third of cases of preterm birth and has additional substantial
consequences for mother and baby including intrauterine infection,
cord compression, pulmonary hypoplasia and placental abruption. As
a result, preterm birth following PROM has even higher rates of
mortality and long-term disability than preterm birth due to other
causes. To reduce the high incidence of PPROM, study of fetal
membrane (FM) biology is requisite. FM rupture normally occurs
shortly before or during spontaneous labour at term in a zone that
overlies the cervix. The supracervical site exhibit increased
rates of apoptosis and extracellular matrix remodelling, and marked
histological changes compared to distal regions, thus reflecting
preparative changes required for membrane rupture in labour at
term. The aim of this project is to gain a better
understanding of the physiological mechanisms involved in FM
rupture with a view to future development of clinically useful
interventions to reduce this potentially devastating complication
of pregnancy.
How does ovarian cancer spread? Dissemination
of epithelial ovarian cancer is different from other cancers
because, unlike the majority of epithelial cancers, it usually
involves local invasion of pelvic and abdominal organs but rarely
involves the vasculature (hematogenous). Tumour cells that are
released/escape from primary ovarian tumours are shed into the
peritoneal cavity where they become a source of disseminated
disease. Populations of these malignant cells aggregate and
form multicellular spheroids. To date, however, the role and
capacity of spheroids in disease progression remains uncertain. The
aim of this project is to determine mechanism by which primary
ovarian cancer metastasis and way of disrupting this process.
Developing IVDMIAs for detecting ovarian
cancer: Each year, more than 200,000 women are diagnosed
with ovarian cancer. Ovarian cancer is the 8th most
common cancer in women and the 2nd most common type of
gynecological cancer in the world In Australia, ~1,500 Australian
women are diagnosed each year and ~850 die from this disease.
Despite recent progress in chemotherapeutic treatments, the
diagnosis of late stage disease is associated with a five-year
survival rate of ~30%. In contrast, when ovarian cancer is
identified at an early stage, five year survival increases to ~90%.
The development of more accurate early detection tests is critia
lto achieve long-term mortality reduction. The aim of this
project is to identify biomarkers of ovarian cancer using advanced
proteomics approaches and develop multivariate index assays
(IVDMIAs) to improve diagnostic performance.
Collaborations
Professor Michael Permezel and Dr Martha
Lappas
Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecolgy, University of
Melbourne
Professor Leon Bach
Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecolgy, University of
Melbourne
Professor Mahesh Choolani
National University Hospital of Singapore, Singapore
Professor Sebastian Illanes Lopez
University of the Andes, Santiago, Chile
Funding Acknowlegdement
Fight Cancer Foundation, Melbourne,
Australia
Selected Publications
- Rice GE, Edgell TA & Autelitano DJ (2010) Evaluation of
midkine and anterior gradient 2 in a multimarker panel for the
detection of ovarian cancer. Journal of Experimental & Clinical
Cancer Research (Accepted May 2010).
- Heng Y, DiQuinzio M, Permezel M, Rice GE. Georgiou HM (2010)
Temporal proteomic analysis of human cevicovaginal fluid with
impending labor J Proteome Res. 2010 Mar 5:1344-50.
- Edgell TA, Barraclough,DL, Rajic A, Dhulia J, Lewis KJ, Armes
JE Barraclough R, Rudland PS, Rice GE & Autelitano DJ. (2010)
Increased plasma concentrations of anterior gradient 2 protein are
positively associated with ovarian cancer. Clinical Clin Sci
(Lond). 30;118:717-25
- Edgell T, Martin-Roussety G, Barker G, Autelitano DJ Allen D,
Grant P, & Rice GE (2010) Phase II Biomarker Trial of a
Multimarker Diagnostic for Ovarian Cancer. Journal of Cancer
Research and Clinical Oncology 136:1079.
- Di Quinzio MKW, Georgiou HM, Holdsworth-Carson SJ, Ayhan M,
Heng YJ, Walker SP, Rice GE, (2008) Permezel M Proteomic analysis
of human cervico-vaginal fluids displays differential protein
expression in association with labour onset at term Journal of
Proteome Res 7:1916- .
- Oliva KT, Ayhan M, Barker G1, Dellios NL, Quinn MA, Rice GE
(2007) Proteomic profiling of ovarian cancer plasma using
immunoaffinity depleted plasma and 2-dimensional PAGE Clin
Proteomics 3:22-29
- Lappas M, Permezel MP, Holdsworth SJ, Zanoni G and Rice GE
(2007) Anti-Inflammatory Effects of the Cyclopentenone Isoprostane
15-A2-IsoP in Human Gestational Tissues Free Radical Biology
Medicine 42: 1791-1796.
- Young IR, Rice GE, Palliser HK, Dellios NL and Hirst JJ (2007)
Identification of bactenecin-1 in cervico-vaginal fluid by
2-dimensional electrophoresis in an ovine model of preterm labour.
Proteomics 7:281-288.
- Konstantakopoulos N, Larsen MR, Campbell IG, Quinn MA, Baker
MS, Georgiou HM and Rice GE (2007) Genistein induces proteomic
changes in the human endometrial carcinoma cell line, Ishikawa.
Clinical Proteomics 2:153-167.
- Lim R, Ahmed N, Riley and Rice GE (2007) Neutrophil
gelatinase-associated lipocalin (NGAL) an early-screening biomarker
for ovarian cancer: NGAL is associated with epidermal growth
factor-induced epithelio-mesenchymal transition. International
Journal of Cancer 120:2426-2434.
- Henschke P, Vorum H, Honore B and Rice GE (2006) Protein
profiling the effects of in vitro hyperoxic exposure on fetal
rabbit lung. Proteomics 2006 6:1957-62
- Ahmed N , Quinn MA and Rice GE (2005) Proteomic tracking of
serum protein isoforms as screening biomarkers of ovarian cancer.
Proteomics 5:4625-4636
- Zhang GY, Ahmed N, Riley C, Oliva, K, Barker G, Quinn MA and
Rice GE (2005) Novel expression of peroxisome
proliferator-activated receptor in epithelial ovarian carcinoma.
British Journal of Cancer 92:113-119
- Knight R, Rice GE and Permezel MP (2005) Are alterations in
plasma protease concentrations during labour associated with
obstetric outcomes? American Journal of Obstetrics & Gynecology
193:283-288.
- Vorum H, Ostergaard M, Henschke P, Riazati-Keshei M and Rice GE
(2004) Proteomic analysis of the effects of hyperoxia on
choriocarcinoma cells in vitro. Proteomics 4:861-867
- Ahmed N, Barker G, Oliva K, Garfin D, Talmadge K, Georgiou H,
Quinn MA and Rice GE (2003) An approach to remove albumin for the
proteomic analysis of low abundant biomarkers in human serum.
Proteomics. 3:1980-1987.
