GenV turns 5 and new investment strengthens prevention research.
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GenView edition #14 | OCT 2026
A milestone period for GenV: research-ready and delivering impact
This month marks five years since GenV welcomed its first families. The ambitious plan to build Australia's largest and most inclusive cohort of children and parents is now a reality, thanks to the tens of thousands of families who said yes. Our GenV children are 3 to 5 years old, opening new opportunities for research, collaboration and real-world impact.
This year we showcased the importance of long-term research into the health and wellbeing of children and parents, as MCRI celebrated its 40th anniversary. We welcomed Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and GenV families to celebrate this milestone. Generation Australia received national attention for its vision to bring together Australia's two major early-life interventional cohorts, GenV and ORIGINS (WA), to tackle some of the nation’s biggest health and wellbeing challenges.
GenV Families meet Prime Minister Anthony Albanese: L to R - Liz with Penelope, and
Saada with Mya
GenV’s Early School Wave pilot planning is under way, with our team working with children, families and stakeholders to shape and test the program. The Early School Wave will offer assessments to 6–8-year-old children and their parents across Victoria. If funded, this whole-of-state program would provide an unprecedented map of physical, mental and cognitive variation and need to guide action as children move through primary school and parents towards mid-life.
We were thrilled to receive a major National Critical Research Infrastructure grant through the Medical Research Future Fund to develop GenV’s Intervention Hub. Led by Professor Raghu Lingam of UNSW, this collaborative initiative will test what works in real-world settings and accelerate evidence into better policies, services and care. With earlier support from the Paul Ramsay Foundation, this grant strengthens GenV's ability to move from understanding problems to testing what prevents or improves them. Read more about the Hub's first Prevention Solutions Forum below.
As GenV turns 5, we are moving from building Australia's largest and most inclusive cohort of children and pre-midlife adults to putting this unique national resource to use. It now fills a major gap in Australia’s research infrastructure, providing the scale, data and capability for researchers to identify opportunities for prevention and to test solutions that improve lives.
Thank you to every family, partner, supporter and colleague who has helped make this possible. Your generosity and commitment have created a unique resource that will grow alongside its participants, supporting better evidence, better decisions and outcomes for generations to come. Here’s to the next 5 years!
Professor Melissa Wake and Ms Natasha Zaritski, GenV Directors
With the GenV Leadership Team
New funding for GenV's Intervention Hub
GenV has received a National Critical Research Infrastructure grant from the Medical Research Future Fund to support its Intervention Hub. The project is led by Professor Raghu Lingam at UNSW Sydney.
The Intervention Hub aims to translate research into action by testing what works in real-world settings and generate evidence to inform better policies, services and care.
The grant builds on earlier funding from the Paul Ramsay Foundation, which helped set up GenV's national platform for intervention research. It will strengthen collaboration across Australia and open up more ways to help children and families stay healthy, and to get support to them earlier.
Together with GenV's unique combination of participant information, biosamples and linked data, the Intervention Hub strengthens GenV's ability to do more than understand health and wellbeing. It helps GenV improve it.
Testing what works: From understanding risk to creating solutions
GenV’s Intervention Hub held its first National Prevention Solutions Forum last month. It brought together researchers, peak bodies, health services, policymakers and community partners to generate trial ideas across four linked Pillars: Heart, Diabetes & Kidney; Brain & Learning; Mental Health & Wellbeing; and Cancer.
The energy was immediate: 85 attendees from 46 organisations across 5 states, and dozens of trial ideas put forward.
These ideas are now shaping Pillar working groups that will co-develop a portfolio of trials to shift the dial on chronic disease.
The Intervention Hub is a once-in-a-generation population prevention learning platform.
It’s made possible because more than 120,000 children and adults consented to be recontacted for trials. That lets researchers test interventions within the cohort and track long-term health, education and service outcomes at a scale not previously possible in Australia.
Follow us on LinkedIn as this work takes shape over the coming months.
Foundation Papers
Two GenV foundational papers are now published, describing how the cohort was designed, who it represents, and how data are collected, linked and protected.
GenV was designed to fill a major gap in Australia’s research infrastructure: the ability to run large, long-term research into how to prevent physical, mental and cognitive health problems, and improve health, wellbeing and productivity across the lifecourse.
The papers describe GenV’s whole-of-state approach and the diversity of participating families. They also explain its ‘build once, use many times’ model. This reduces the burden on families while enabling research that would otherwise be difficult or impossible at this scale.
Together, they provide an important reference for researchers, policy makers and partners interested in using GenV as a national research resource.
Meet GenV's new PhD students
Behind every GenV discovery are researchers working to turn family contributions into better health and wellbeing.
We're delighted to welcome four new PhD students to GenV: Sophie Abel, Susara Ouchithya, Tsion Mulat Tebeje and Jo Chen. Their projects explore topics ranging from pregnancy and birth outcomes to children's mental health, healthy school environments and new ways of using linked health data.
They represent the next generation of researchers helping build the evidence needed to improve the lives of children and families.
GenV PhD supervisors with PhD students. From left to right: Prof. Melissa Wake, Assoc. Prof. Suzanne Mavoa, Sophie Abel, Dr. Susan Clifford, Tsion Mulat Tebeje, Susara Ouchithya.
In case you missed it
It's been a busy few months for GenV, with media coverage showcasing the value of long-term child and parent research.
- MCRI 40th anniversary – Prime Minister Anthony Albanese joined GenV families and researchers to celebrate four decades of child health research and innovation.
- GenHEART in the media – Building momentum for action on childhood obesity and heart health through a new national initiative powered by Generation Australia.
- Generation Australia gains national attention – Learn how GenV and ORIGINS (WA) are working together to create a national platform for child and family research.
- INSPIRE magazine – GenV Cohort Lead, Alisha Gülenç shares how an inclusive, family-centred approach is building Australia's largest and most diverse child and parent research cohort.
- How early life shapes lifelong health – Professor Donna Geddes explains how GenV is enabling researchers to connect human milk, the microbiome and child health in new ways.
Are you considering a new child, adult or family study?
GenV is Australia’s largest and most inclusive longitudinal cohort of children and parents.
Missed an edition? Find all previous GenView newsletters here.
GenV is led from the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute (MCRI), supported by The Royal Children’s Hospital and The University of Melbourne, and funded by the Paul Ramsay Foundation, the Victorian Government, The Royal Children’s Hospital Foundation, the National Health and Medical Research Council and the Medical Research Future Fund.
