Professor Francine Marques is an National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) Emerging Leader, Viertel Charitable Foundation, and National Heart Foundation Fellow. She completed a PhD in genomics at the University of Sydney in 2012, followed by a joint postdoctoral training at Federation University Australia and the University of Melbourne (funded by NHMRC and Heart Foundation fellowships) and the Baker Heart and Diabetes Institute (funded by a Heart Foundation fellowship). Since 2018, she has led the Hypertension Research Laboratory at Monash University. Her team aims to build exceptional scientists that help improve cardiovascular health, using translational approaches to lower blood pressure via the gut microbiome. Her research program has attracted over $10 million in competitive funding and resulted in over 130 peer-reviewed papers and 31 awards, including the 2019 American Heart Association Hypertension Council Goldblatt Award, the 2020 High Blood Pressure Research Council of Australia and 2021 International Society of Hypertension Mid-Career Awards,  the 2021 Australian Academy of Science Gottschalk Medal, and the 2024 Australian Society of Medical Research Peter Doherty Leading Light Award.