Professor Margaret Brimble, CNZM, Auckland.
For services to science. Professor Margaret Brimble is head of the Brimble Group, a team of highly qualified and experienced researchers at the University of Auckland. She is Chair of Organic and Medicinal Chemistry in the Department of Chemistry at the University of Auckland. She is Director of Medicinal Chemistry for Neuren Pharmaceuticals and Principal Investigator of the Maurice Wilkins Centre for Molecular Biology. She is Chair and a trustee of the Rutherford Foundation of the Royal Society of New Zealand, and was a member of the Marsden Fund Council, and of the Organic and Biomolecular Chemistry Editorial Board. As a researcher, she has focused on the synthesis of bioactive natural products as novel anticancer, antibacterial and antiviral agents. She developed a drug for Neuren Pharmaceuticals for the treatment of traumatic brain-injury in partnership with the United States Army. In 2009 she was appointed as Adjunct Professor of La Trobe University, Australia. She was made a member of the New Zealand Order of Merit in 2004. Professor Brimble received the New Zealand Institute of Chemistry HortResearch Prize for Excellence in Chemical Sciences in 2005, the L’Oreal-UNESCO Women in Science Asia-Pacific Laureate in materials science in 2007, and the World Class New Zealand Award in 2008.