WAGER Team

WAGER is administered by a team of bioinformatics specialists which is overseen by the WAGER Director.

WAGER Director

Professor Lyle Palmer

WAGER Director, University of Western Australia

Professor Palmer is an internationally renowned geneticist and epidemiologist who is an expert in the genetics of complex respiratory diseases. He is the Foundation Chair in Genetic Epidemiology at the University of Western Australia, where he is also a Professor in the Schools of Medicine & Pharmacology and Population Health. He is the founder of the Laboratory for Genetic Epidemiology in the Western Australian Institute for Medical Research. Before returning to Western Australia in mid-2003, he was an Assistant Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School and the Director of Statistical Genomics at the Channing Laboratory, Boston.

Bioinformatics Team

Paul White

Informatics System Development, University of Western Australia

Paul holds a Bachelor of Science and an Honours degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of Western Australia. Paul also graduated with an MBA from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Sloan School of Management in 1999. Paul has worked in the Information Technology sector for more than 20 years in Australia, Hong Kong and the US.

Prior to returning to Australia in 2004 from the US, Paul was a Principal at Diamond Technology Partners, a Chicago-based management consulting firm, before becoming the Enterprise Architect for a large biotechnology company in Boston. Since returning to Perth, Paul has worked with a number of start-up companies as well as on large State Government and private sector projects in management and technical roles.

Paul manages the development of the informatics solutions for the Western Australian Genetic Epidemiology Resource (WAGER) group at the Laboratory for Genetic Epidemiology.

Chris Williams

Analyst / Programmer, University of Western Australia

Chris graduated from the University of Western Australia in 2004 after completing Honours degrees in Science (Computer Science) and Electronic Engineering. After joining WAIMR later that year, he completed pilot laboratory information systems for the WA Sleep Health Study and the Lions Eye Institute Age-related Macular Degeneration Study. Chris continues to provide informatics support to several research groups as well as core informatics infrastructure as part of the WAGER project.

Chris Ellis

Analyst / Programmer, University of Western Australia

Chris graduated from Murdoch University in 2001 with a double major in Computer Science and Information Systems. He completed his Honours in Computer Science in 2002 and began a Graduate Software Engineer position at Fujitsu Australia Ltd, working with a large database management system as utilised by the Department of Housing and Works of Western Australia. After 2 years at Fujitsu, Chris came to the Centre for Genetic Epidemiology to take up the role of Analyst/Programmer. This position involves the analysis, design and construction of Oracle databases and web-based front-end interfaces for research groups that form part of the WAGER project.

Declan Lynch

Analyst / Programmer, University of Western Australia

Declan graduated in 1988 with a National Diploma (Ireland) in Electronic Engineering from the Dublin Institute of Technology (DIT). Following graduation he took a job as a Calibration Engineer where he was involved in the repair and calibration of industrial electronic test equipment in accordance with industry standards. In 1990 he returned to DIT as a Technical Support Engineer at the School of Control Systems and Electronic Engineering. He was involved in many projects in the areas of Electrical/Electronic and Control Systems Engineering as well as Information Technology. He graduated from DIT with a BSc(Hons) in Information Technology in 2004, following five years of part-time study. He completed his honours in Software Engineering, Database Management Systems and Internet Development with a project developing an open-source Geographic Information System. After emigrating to Perth in September 2005, he joined WAIMR as an Analyst/Programmer in February 2006.

Kristian Menendez

IT Support Analyst, University of Western Australia

Kristian has a major in Computer Science from Centroamerican University (UCA), as well as a Diploma in Software Technology and a Microsoft certification from the APTECH Institute in India. In 2000 He spent a year in Berkeley, CA working as a Web Assistant Administrator and as a Technical Support Officer for Assistive Technology. In 2001 he returned to El Salvador where he held positions in the government sector as well as in the private sector. In late 2001 he joined a Germany based banking institution. In 2004 He took over the position of Database Administrator. In March 2008 He emigrated to Perth and joined the GenEpi group as an IT Support Analyst.