Danika Hill is a Laboratory Head in the Department of Immunology and Pathology, working to understand the cellular and molecular mechanisms that underpin robust responses to vaccination and infection, with a particular interest in T follicular helper cells and the Germinal Centre response. Dr Hill’s research uses multi-disciplinary human clinical cohorts approaches and cutting-edge immunological techniques (high-parameter flow cytometry, single cell RNA and immune repertoire sequencing) to study Group A Streptoccous, malaria and influenza immunity.  

Dr Hill studied Biomedical Science at the University of Adelaide, and completed a PhD at the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research. From 2015, Danika was a Postdoc in Dr Michelle Linterman’s group at the Babraham Institute in Cambridge, before joining Monash University in 2020. Danika’s research is supported by an NHMRC CJ Martin Fellowship and a Michelson Prize from the Human Vaccines Project. Dr Hill is an emerging global leader in human immunology, as evidenced by lecturing for Monash University, Swiss Tropical & Public Health Institute, and being selected as a “Rising Star in Immunology” the Norwegian Society for Immunology.

Danika has made several important discoveries about how T follicular helper cells support the germinal centre response to influenza and malaria vaccines (e.g J Exp Med 2019, eLife 2020, eLife 2021), and how immune development in children influences vaccination outcomes (Science Translational Medicine 2020).

Discovering targets of long-lived humoral immunity for Strep A vaccine design.