The researchers’ trailblazing work in exploring a new physical realm and protecting and enhancing human life promises significant benefits at global levels. Their research projects explore quantum physics, cancer treatment, misinformation, superbugs and mathematical analysis.

The Marsden Fund of the Royal Society Te Apārangi is regarded as the hallmark of excellence for research in Aotearoa New Zealand, and competition for grants is intense. The Marsden Fund invests in excellent, investigator-led research aimed at generating new knowledge, with the potential for long-term economic, environmental or health benefit to New Zealand. From a total of 978 proposals received in the preliminary round this year, 107 – or only the top 10.9 per cent of applications – have been awarded funding to the tune of $80.3 million (excluding GST) over three years. Massey University researchers have been awarded $4,349,000 (excluding GST).

All Massey University’s 2025 Marsden Fund recipients lead international teams:

• Professor Joachim Brand: Exploring hidden patterns in the coldest matter in the universe
• Professor Vyacheslav Filichev: Innovative shape-shifting drugs to fight drug resistance in cancer
• Associate Professor Stephen Hill: Unpacking how we choose who to trust for knowledge in complex, contentious issues with the potential for misinformation
• Professor Jasna Rakonjac: Safeguarding the future from superbugs by preventing the spread of antimicrobial resistance genes
• Associate Professor David Simpson: Empowering research analysts with better mathematical tools for analysing physical phenomena that switch between different behaviours.

Massey academics are also involved in funded research projects led by other institutions. These include:

• Interstellar Asteroids, Black Holes and the Big Bang (Marsden Fund Council Award, University of Auckland) – Associate Professor Pauline Harris, Te Pūtahi a Toi School of Māori Knowledge, College of Humanities and Social Science.
• Understanding complex cycles of competition (University of Auckland) – Associate Professor David Simpson, School of Mathematical and Computational Sciences, College of Sciences.
• Using Bacteria to Create Sustainable Dyes (Victoria University of Wellington) – Associate Professor Faith Kane and Angela Kilford, School of Design, Toi Rauwhārangi College of Creative Arts.

Provost Professor Giselle Byrnes congratulated the successful recipients of this year’s Marsden Fund grants.

“We proudly congratulate these researchers and their teams on successfully securing this significant research funding. This achievement reflects the calibre, innovation and impact of their work, and underscores Massey University’s commitment to advancing knowledge and addressing global challenges.

“As well as addressing critical and fundamental research problems, these projects are distinguished by their international reach and commitment to making world-leading change for the better. We look forward to the transformative outcomes this funding will enable.”

Read more about the successful Marsden Fund projects on the Royal Society website.

Professor Joachim Brand

New Zealand Institute of Advanced Studies, College of Sciences

Quantum physics is the study of matter and energy through the behaviour of particles like atoms and electrons. What happens when matter is cooled to temperatures just above absolute zero? At these extremes, atoms behave in strange and wonderful ways, forming new states of matter that defy everyday understanding.

One such mysterious state is called odd-frequency superfluidity – a phenomenon so elusive that scientists have dubbed it a ‘hidden order.’ Unlike traditional superfluids, whereby particles pair up in space, odd-frequency superfluids involve particles pairing in time, making them incredibly difficult to detect in conventional materials.

This research aims to uncover and understand this hidden quantum behaviour using ultracold atoms. Tiny clouds of gas are quantum simulators that can emulate solid materials when chilled to near-zero temperatures and manipulated with lasers and magnetic fields. Based on a recent theoretical breakthrough, the team will devise highly controlled experiments to recreate and study these exotic pairings.

By developing new theoretical tools and running sophisticated computer simulations, they hope to answer key questions: Can this strange state of matter exist on its own? How can we detect it? And what does it tell us about the quantum world?

Associate Investigators: Professor Michele Governale and Professor Ulrich Zuelicke, both from Victoria University of Wellington; Professor Jörg Schmalian, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Germany; Associate Professor Nir Navon, Yale University, United States; and Professor Ali Alavi, Max Planck Institute for Solid State Research, Germany.

Professor Vyacheslav Filichev

School of Food Technology and Natural Sciences, College of Sciences

Innovative shape-shifting drugs to fight drug resistance in cancer

Cancer therapies that initially prove successful can eventually fail, leading to cancer recurrence and spread to other parts of the body in the process of metastasis. Why do these therapies fail?

Research conducted in the last decade has identified that two closely related enzymes of our immune system go rogue in cancer and start mutating our genomic DNA in cancer cells – devastatingly, often in response to anti-cancer drugs. These acquired mutations drive genetic diversity in cancer cells and often allow tumours to ignore and survive anti-cancer drugs.

A group of chemists and structural biologists from Massey University have assembled a team of leading experts in the chemistry of shapeshifters and cancer cell biology from the University of Adelaide in Australia and the University of Texas-Health, San Antonio, United States, to fight drug resistance caused by these enzymes.

The team hypothesises that a potent inhibitor of these two enzymes can block the rise of acquired mutations in cancers and in this way extend and improve the efficacy of existing frontline cancer therapies. This will give extra time for cancer therapy to work and lead to higher rates of remission, benefitting patients and health systems everywhere.

The New Zealand-led international team will leverage their world-leading knowledge of how to disable these enzymes and, in a conceptually new approach to drug design, to harness the power of molecules that can ‘shape-shift’ or spontaneously adapt their shape, to create a single inhibitor that can fit to and potently disable both closely related enzymes implicated in development of drug resistance.

There are many advantages to progressing only one inhibitor to clinical studies, including cost and simplicity of therapeutic use. Additionally, this shape-adapting drug design could also have wider applications across science and medicine, potentially changing how we approach complex diseases beyond cancer.

Associate Investigators: Dr Thomas Fallon, University of Adelaide, Australia; Dr Elena Harjes, Dr Stefan Harjes, Professor Geoffrey Jameson and Dr Harikrishnan Kurup, all from Massey University; and Professor Reuben Harris, University of Texas Health San Antonio, United States.

Associate Professor Stephen Hill

School of Psychology, College of Humanities and Social Sciences

Unpacking how we choose who to trust for knowledge in complex, contentious issues with the potential for misinformation

Previous research has shown that simply believing that experts such as scientists, academics or skilled public servants understand something makes us feel like we better understand those things.

Nearly all research in this area has been on people’s understanding of uncontroversial phenomena, like how rainbows form. In these knowledge-forming environments, only one epistemic – or knowledge – authority exists. Harm is unlikely to eventuate from an inflated or misplaced sense of understanding in these straightforward situations.

Contentious issues like vaccination, climate change, genetically modified food, generative artificial intelligence and the Treaty Principles Bill are complex phenomena involving multiple epistemic authorities, including ‘alternative thinkers.’

How choosing a position from the different claims in these knowledge debates affects our thinking and ‘feeling of knowing’ about the way such complex phenomena work is the thrust of this pioneering research.

The stakes are high because overconfidence about our understanding may have disastrous consequences: for example, if you feel strongly but incorrectly that you understand how a chemical affects your body, you may be led to decisions that harm yourself or others.

A multidisciplinary team of cognitive and psychological scientists from New Zealand and Australia seeks to identify the markers that people use to decide about who to trust for knowledge of complex phenomena. Through a series of experimental studies, the team will unpack the way these markers affect our sense of understanding of the world – leading to a greater understanding of the causal relationships that link trust, understanding and behaviour.

By better understanding how ‘knowledge illusions’ take root, this research will inform new strategies to reduce the harms of misinformation and help people make more informed decisions in an increasingly complex world.

Associate Investigators: Dr Matthew Williams, Massey University; Dr John Kerr, University of Otago andProfessor Rachel Zajac, University of Otago; and Dr Mathew Marques, La Trobe University, Australia.

Professor Jasna Rakonjac

School of Food Technology and Natural Sciences, College of Sciences

Safeguarding the future from superbugs by preventing the spread of antimicrobial resistance genes

One of the top threats to global public health identified by the World Health Organization is Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR) or ‘superbugs’. Without action, by 2050 there would be 10 million deaths a year globally due to AMR – exceeding cancer rates, and with an accumulative global economic cost of US$100 trillion.

Gram-negative bacteria, including Escherichia coli, the subject of this research, are the leading group of bacteria causing AMR-associated death or disease due to their high resistance to antibiotics. AMR is a substantially higher risk for Māori and Pacific people due to their higher risk of severe infectious disease.

Antimicrobial treatment favours growth of AMR bacteria in the gut, inducing the spread of AMR genes to other susceptible gut bacteria. These new superbugs spread between people and enter the environment through human excrement in sewage systems and animal waste. This potential for widespread transmission accelerates the approach to total AMR domination – also termed the ‘post-antibiotic era’.

This research will dissect the workings of the AMR-spreading weaponry shared by all bacteria and identify weak points. With these insights, the research team will identify the molecules to use as part of new antimicrobial treatments to minimise the spread of AMR among gut bacteria. Some of the agents that prevent AMR spread amongst gut bacteria will also be suitable as standalone therapeutics to specifically target and eliminate existing AMR bacteria.

This approach is aligned with the policy of One Health Aotearoa, an alliance of New Zealand’s leading infectious diseases researchers, which recognises that the only effective mechanism to manage AMR is an integrated approach to human, animal and environmental health. The new therapeutics will be valuable products and will not only have health and environmental benefits, but also economic benefits for New Zealand.

Associate Investigators: Dr Vicki Gold, Dr Rebecca Conners and Dr Vuong Van Hung Le, all from the University of Exeter, United Kingdom.

Associate Professor David Simpson

School of Mathematical and Computational Sciences, College of Sciences

*Empowering research analysts with better mathematical tools for analysing physical phenomena that switch between different behaviours *

Research analysts who gather and interpret data for physical phenomena use mathematical models for many practical applications, such as predicting the weather, designing electronic devices and studying the behaviour of animals.

Their work entails a wide variety of mathematical and statistical tools. However, many of these tools do not apply to systems that switch back and forth between distinct types of behaviour. Examples include engineering systems with on/off control, dynamic market prices and large-scale aspects of Earth’s climate.

This research will significantly empower analysts by developing new strategies for analysing mathematical models of these switched dynamical systems.

The research team will exploit these systems’ degenerate or anomalous properties – special geometric features existing within the abstract phase space of the model – testing their theory that these properties provide a novel and overlooked avenue by which model predictions can be assimilated more precisely and effectively.

Using new mathematical techniques that the team has recently developed, it aims to show how the properties enable pertinent aspects of the dynamics to be captured with simpler sets of equations. These are more amenable to exact analysis, while still exhibiting high complexity – including chaos.

Results will be applied to models of ocean circulation and the internal dynamics of deep neural networks.

The strategies developed will provide a new framework enabling research analysts to evaluate switched dynamical systems in a raft of diverse applications including the environment, the health system and the economy.

Associate Investigators: Professor Paul Glendinning, The University of Manchester and Professor Chris Budd, University of Bath, United Kingdom.

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