Dr Priyanka Rana is a researcher at the Centre for Health Informatics (CHI), Australian Institute of Health Innovation (AIHI). She received her PhD in Computer Science from UNSW Sydney in March 2023. She specialises in interpretable and multimodal machine learning for precision oncology. Her research focuses on developing AI methods that integrate digital pathology and clinical data to predict treatment response, patient survival, and support personalised cancer care. Her expertise spans computer vision, multiplex immunofluorescence imaging, multimodal learning, generative AI, weakly supervised learning, foundation models, synthetic data, AI interpretability and AI transportability. Her long-term vision is to bridge the gap between AI research and clinical practice by developing trustworthy, interpretable, and transportable AI that supports precision medicine.

Awards & Funding:

• Nominated for Research Australia Discovery Award (2026)
  by Dr Wayne Harvey, Executive Chair, Australian Melanoma Research Foundation.
• Researcher of the Year Award, CHI, Australian Institute of Health Innovation, 2025 — awarded to an individual demonstrating exceptional leadership and outstanding achievement in publishing and advancing new research opportunities.
• Early Career Scientist Grant, Australian Melanoma Research Foundation (AMRF, 2025) — a nationally competitive early-career funding scheme supporting innovative melanoma research; selected as one of only four recipients nationwide, awarded as Principal Investigator (PI).
• Macquarie Minds and Intelligence Initiative Early Career Researcher Grant, 2025 — an institutional funding scheme supporting projects focused on Decision Intelligence, awarded as PI.
• Macquarie Research Acceleration Scheme (MQRAS) Grant, 2024 — a highly competitive university scheme supporting high-potential seeding projects and research translation initiatives, awarded as PI.
• Early Career Researcher Enabling Scheme, Macquarie University, 2023 — an institutional funding scheme supporting early career researchers, awarded as PI.
• Winner, Early Career Researcher Showcase Competition, Macquarie University, 2023.
• UNSW Women in Engineering Scholarship (2019 – 2023) — a competitive merit-based scholarship awarded during PhD candidature.
• Australian Government Research Training Program (RTP) Scholarship (2019 – 2023) — a nationally competitive scholarship supporting high-achieving doctoral researchers.

• Lead investigator in a collaborative research program with the Melanoma Institute Australia (MIA), developing AI methods for multiplex immunofluorescence (mIF) imaging to predict melanoma immunotherapy response, deepen understanding of treatment response, and advance personalised cancer care. 
• Co-lead, multimodal AI project for survival prediction in colorectal cancer, in collaboration with the School of Clinical Medicine, UNSW. Responsible for analysis protocol design, integration of imaging, molecular and clinical data, and model development.
• Co-lead, AI-driven drug-screening platform with Precision Cancer Therapy lab, MQ, predicting therapy response from cell-line assays, with validation cohorts supplied by MIA and Chris O'Brien Lifehouse. Responsible for the machine learning components of the platform.
• Key member of the National Infrastructure for federated learNing in DigitAl health (NINA) project, a national federated learning initiative involving industry and healthcare partners, including Stryker and Queensland Health. 

I am actively recruiting MRes and PhD students. Interested candidates with a strong background in Computer Science, Artificial Intelligence, Data Science, Software Engineering, or a closely related discipline are strongly encouraged to apply.

Please note: I have reached my supervision capacity for the current scholarship round (application deadline: 31 July) and am unable to consider additional applications for this intake. I welcome enquiries from prospective students interested in future scholarship rounds.

Current students as primary or co-supervisor:

Xingnan Li, PhD (Oct 2025 ~ ) 

Silpa Chandrabhasi Sindhu, Phd (Oct 2025 ~)

Jack Mahon, MRes (Jan 2025 ~ March 2026) - Graduated

Aryan Luthra, MD (July 2024 ~ July 2026) - Completed

Hiruni Jayasekara, MD (Aug 2025 ~)

Jessica Kahlon, MD (Aug 2025 ~)

Xingnan Li, MRes (March 2024 ~ July 2025) - Graduated

• Invited international speaker:
  • Google AI for Science, Sydney (November 2025).
  • National Cancer Institute and K-Bio Lab, South Korea (December 2025).
  • Women in AI workshop, UNSW AI Institute (December 2023).
  • Mobilising Computable Biomedical Knowledge webinar (2023).
• Oral presentation, IEEE International Symposium on Biomedical Imaging (ISBI), London (2026).
• Invited tutorial presenter, Medical Image Computing and Computer-Assisted Intervention (MICCAI), Singapore (2022).
• Peer reviewer:
  • IEEE Transactions on Medical Imaging.
  • Neural Networks (Elsevier).
  • IEEE International Symposium on Biomedical Imaging (2025, 2026).
  • IEEE-EMBS International Conference on Biomedical and Health Informatics (2026)
• Media and public engagement
  • Profiled by the Australian Melanoma Research Foundation in its "Meet the Researcher" series. (May 2026) [link]
  • Research on AI-powered personalised immunotherapy covered by Pulse+IT, the leading independent digital health news platform for Australia, New Zealand and Europe. (November 2025) [link]
  • Research featured by com.au, a clinical oncology news outlet, highlighting the clinical relevance of AI-supported immunofluorescence imaging for melanoma care. (November 2025) [link]
  • Featured as a 2025 grant recipient by the Australian Melanoma Research Foundation. (June 2025) [link]
  • Interviewed on 2SER radio following the ECR Showcase Competition win, discussing how AI is being used to guide melanoma treatment decisions. (April 2024) [link]

• Panel member, Research Compute and Storage Allocation Panel, Macquarie University (2025~present) — review and approve institutional compute and storage allocation requests.
• Panel member, Macquarie University Postgraduate Research Fund (PGRF) grant review (2023).
• Panel member, Macquarie University Early Career Researcher Enabling Scheme grant review (2024, 2025).
• Judge, Encourage Symposium, Macquarie University (2024, 2025).
• Judge, ECR Research Showcase, Macquarie University (2025).

• MEDI8310 - Research Project: Doctor of Medicine (Macquarie MD). Year/Session: 2025 - present. Form of teaching: Project supervision. 
• COMP8851 — Major Project Supervision: Postgraduate (Master's). Year/Session: 2024, Term 1. Form of teaching: Project supervision.
• MEDI8400 - Research Project : Doctor of Medicine (Macquarie MD). Year/Session: 2024 - present. Form of teaching: Project supervision.
• The Professional and Community Engagement program (PACE), Macquarie Business School. Postgraduate (Master's). Year/Session: 2024, Term 2. Form of teaching: Project supervision.

October 2015 - June 2018 : Lecturer at James Cook University, Singapore. Priyanka has taught postgraduate and undergraduate courses in Computer Science covering topics such as Computer vision, Design thinking, Human-Computer tnteraction, Data mining, E-Strategic management, Algorithms and Data structures, and Android development.