Our People
Director - Prof Ben Howden
Professor Ben Howden is a public health microbiologist, infectious diseases physician and molecular biologist. He is Director of the Microbiological Diagnostic Unit Public Health Laboratory (MDU PHL), Head of the Howden Research Group and is a co-lead of the Global Health cross-cutting discipline at the Doherty Institute. In his roles, Ben is responsible for the provision of public health laboratory services, national and global research activities in pathogen genomics and antimicrobial resistance (AMR), and capacity and capability building programs primarily focussed in the Asia Pacific region.
Deputy Director - A/Prof Norelle Sherry
A/Prof Norelle Sherry is a medical microbiologist and infectious diseases physician, and Deputy Director of the MDU Public Health Laboratory. She is the co-lead of the Laboratory and Surveillance Stream of the WHO Collaborating Centre for Antimicrobial Resistance at the Doherty Institute, and co-lead of the Doherty Antimicrobial Resistance Theme. She is also a clinician-researcher working in antimicrobial resistance, genomics implementation and public health microbiology in the Howden lab group.
Mathilda Wilmot
Our Teams
Our work is delivered by expert teams spanning reference microbiology, food and water testing, genomic surveillance, public health programs and sexual health diagnostics. Each team plays a vital role in supporting disease prevention, outbreak response and public health decision-making across Victoria, Australia, and the region.
