Cade Christensen's career got off to a uniquely exhilarating start, with the California-native working as a Special Operations Intelligence Officer in the U.S Air Force, before moving across the world to pursue bioinformatics. Based at SAHMRI for the past 18 months, he’s swapped military intelligence for medical research — applying new skills to unravel the biology behind neurological conditions.

He works alongside Dr Inushi De Silva, who recently completed her PhD on tumour growth in glioblastoma — one of the most aggressive and complex forms of brain cancer.

They're both under the guidance of Professor Cedric Bardy in the Laboratory for Human Neurophysiology and Genetics, which bioengineers live human brain tissue in petri dishes, to facilitate the discovery and validation of treatments for brain disorders.