Rate My Professor Julia Horsfield

Professor Julia Horsfield is a developmental geneticist serving as Professor in the Department of Pathology at the University of Otago's Dunedin School of Medicine. She earned a BSc majoring in Botany and Honours in Biochemistry from Victoria University of Wellington, a PhD from the University of Otago in 1995 on molecular mechanisms to inhibit HIV replication under Professor Warren Tate, and a Diploma in Applied Science. After her PhD, she worked at the University of Adelaide's Department of Genetics on cell cycle control in development. From 1999 to 2007, she was a Senior Research Fellow at the University of Auckland's Department of Molecular Medicine and Pathology, initiating zebrafish research. She joined the University of Otago in 2007, establishing the multi-user Otago Zebrafish Facility in 2009. Current roles include Head of the Department of Pathology, Dean of the Otago School of Biomedical Sciences (appointed 2025), Director of Genetics Otago since 2017, and Director of the Otago Zebrafish Facility. She previously served as Associate Dean for Postgraduate Education in the Dunedin School of Medicine (2015-2017).

Her laboratory studies chromosome packaging by cohesin and CTCF proteins and its regulation of gene expression during embryogenesis and in cancer, employing zebrafish models to explore developmental disorders such as Cornelia de Lange syndrome and the first links between cohesin mutations and human leukaemia. Key publications include the edited volume Chromatin: Methods and Protocols (Springer, 2022), 'Cohesin and CTCF emerge as building blocks of 3D genome structure' (2024), 'Full circle: a brief history of cohesin and the regulation of gene expression' (FEBS Journal, 2023), 'Recurrent de novo variants in the spliceosomal factor CRNKL1 are associated with severe microcephaly...' (American Journal of Human Genetics, 2025), and contributions to Development and Genes to Cells (2025). She has received the Fulbright New Zealand Scholar award (2019) for single-cell sequencing at UC Davis and Irvine, Health Research Council Explorer Grant (2015), Health Research Publication Award (2016), and Marsden Fund grants including $941,000 (2024), alongside three Marsden grants and two HRC projects. Horsfield leads Genetics Otago with nearly 270 members, supports nine principal investigators via the zebrafish facility, and delivered her Inaugural Professorial Lecture.