Anna Hudson

Senior Research Fellow

College of Medicine and Public Health

+61 8 8201 3067
place Flinders Medical Centre
GPO Box 2100, ADELAIDE, SA, 5001

My research aims to understand respiratory physiology, respiratory motor impairment and breathlessness (aka dyspnoea), in health, healthy ageing and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. I use a multi-faceted approach to investigate the neural control of breathing such as electromyography to assess respiratory muscle activity, electroencephalography to assess brain activity and respiratory sensation and ultrasound for respiratory muscle mechanics.

I am most well known for single motor unit recordings from human respiratory muscles that implicate the spinal cord as the site of integration of multiple descending neural drives to the motoneurones during respiratory and non-respiratory contractions. I established the ‘principle of motor unit recruitment by neuromechanical matching’, which is applicable to all movements we make and is relevant to the broader field of motor control.

Qualifications

2010 PhD, Respiratory Physiology, University of New South Wales

2006 BSc (Hons 1st class), Respiratory Physiology, University of New South Wales

2003 BSc (Biomed Sci), University of Adelaide

Honours, awards and grants

Highlights:

2023 Flinders University 'Near Miss Funding' for NHMRC Ideas Grant

2022 Flinders Foudation Health Seed Grant

2018 NHMRC Project Grant

2018 Rebecca L. Cooper Medical Research Foundation Project Grant

2018 Thoracic Society of Australia and New Zealand Janet Elder International Travel Award

2017 Lung Foundation Australia/Boehringer Ingelheim COPD Research Fellowship

2015 Australian Academy of Science FASIC Early Career Fellowship

2014 University of New South Wales Dean’s Rising Star Award

2012 University of New South Wales Mark Rowe Prize for outstanding doctoral thesis in neurophysiology

2011 NHMRC Early Career Fellowship (Overseas Biomedical Fellowship)

2010 University of New South Wales Best PhD Prize in the School of Medical Sciences

2006 University of New South Wales University Medal in Physiology

Key responsibilities

I conduct laboratory-based research in healthy and clinical populations with local, national and international collaborators. I supervise Honours, Masters and PhD students.

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Respiratory research
Muscles
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  • Muscles