Early career academic Dr Fiona CoulsonDr Fiona Coulson has really enjoyed her first year at CQU Rockhampton, thanks to working with a "great team and supportive supervisor" on campus and appreciating the pace of the local lifestyle.

But then maybe it helps that she is a positive thinker - her second child is due in March next year and she is considering training for the Gold Coast half-marathon in July.

Fiona has been among 21 staff members who have completed an early-career academic program and praises the initiative for providing guidance on career progression as well as opportunities for interaction with other early-career researchers.

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"My career has jumped around a little - trying to find what I really enjoy doing and living somewhere that is conducive to family life," she says. (Fiona notes that she is enjoying living near the coast, where she can go paddling with her daughter and playing with the family's noisy basset hound.)

Her career to date includes: PhD in pharmacology from UQ (St Lucia Campus); Post-doctoral fellowship at Johns Hopkins University School of Public Health in Baltimore, USA; Lecturer in Pharmacology at Griffith University on Gold Coast in Schools of Health Science and Pharmacy; Research fellowship at UQ School of Medicine Rural Clinical Division based in Rockhampton; Started as Lecturer in Biomedical Science at CQU on January 2, 2008.

Fiona currently teaches into the Bachelors of Science, Biomedical Science and Nursing and this year co-supervised third-year research project students with the help of Dr Andrew Fenning.

When not on maternity leave next year, she will co-supervise (again with Dr Fenning) Biomedical Science Honours students.

She is researching (and introducing students to research) in the areas of diabetes, cardiovascular disease and gastrointestinal disorders, focusing on pharmacology and immunology of these diseases, and these interests include both human and animal studies.