NEUROSCIENCE, NEUROPHARMACOLOGY AND EXERCISE SCIENCE
Dr Jacob Thorstensen,
Neuroscientist & Assistant Professor,
Faculty of Health Sciences & Medicine
Bond University, Queensland, Australia &
Honorary Research Fellow
The School of Biomedical Sciences,
The University of Queensland
Queensland, Australia
RESEARCHER PROFILE
Filmed in the Gold Coast, Australia | November 2025
Dr Jacob Thorstensen is an early-career Assistant Professor in Neuroscience and Physiology in the Faculty of Health Sciences & Medicine at Bond University. He is also an honorary research fellow in The School of Biomedical Sciences at The University of Queensland.
Dr Thorstensen graduated first-class honours in exercise science, completed a PhD in neurophysiology at Griffith University, and completed a post-doctoral research fellowship in neurology at The University of Queensland.
His research uses non-invasive neurostimulation techniques to study how the brain and spinal cord control muscles in human subjects.
His findings have been published in several discipline-leading scientific journals including The Journal of Physiology, Journal of Neurophysiology and Neuropharmacology and disseminated at large, international scientific meetings.
His work has unveiled several new neuroscientific mechanisms which have future applications for movement disorders. Recent recognitions include being on the Forbes 30 Under 30 list for the Healthcare & Science Category (2024) and being selected as a Career Achievement Award finalist in the 7NEWS QLD Young Achiever Awards (2025).
Dr Thorstensen sits on the editorial boards for The Journal of Physiology and Journal of Applied Physiology.
He is a part of the executive committee for the Australasian Brain Stimulation Society, and the early career researcher and education committees for the International Society of Electrophysiology and Kinesiology.
He is also part of a team that has recently been funded through a Multiple Sclerosis Australia Incubator Grant for a neurostimulation project.
Source: Supplied
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6821-1547
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Prescribing exercise to regional population with cardiovascular disease & diabetes
Associate Professor Gordon’s research is aimed at determining the optimal methods of prescribing and implementing exercise as part of the health care plan for people with cardiovascular disease and diabetes. Specifically, he is leading work to determine if and how the components of exercise can be considered as a whole for prescribing exercise to generate health benefits. This is important to overcome the series of barriers that people living in rural and regional areas experience when trying to become active.
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Next-generation NK cell-based immunotherapies for hard-to-treat cancers
Associate Professor Fernando Guimaraes is an internationally recognised leader in cancer immunotherapy and natural killer (NK) cell biology. Based at The University of Queensland, he leads innovative research focused on developing next-generation NK cell-based immunotherapies for hard-to-treat cancers, including sarcomas and neuroblastoma.
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Using Gut Microbes to Reduce Blood Pressure
Professor Francine Marques is an National Health and Medical Research Council Emerging Leader, Viertel Charitable Foundation, and National Heart Foundation Fellow.
She leads the Hypertension Research Laboratory at Monash University and has published more than 120 peer-reviewed papers in journals such as Nature Reviews Cardiology, Nature Medicine, Nature Cardiovascular Research, and Circulation.
