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Professor Catherine Itsiopoulos was appointed as Deputy Vice-Chancellor STEM College and Vice-President in 2025. Catherine is responsible for academic leadership of the STEM college comprising 5 schools and is the Head of the Bundoora Health Precinct. She was previously the Executive Dean of Health and Biomedical Sciences at RMIT University, where she championed the growth of health disciplines, research grant success, and strategic health partnerships such as the RMIT-Northern Health Clinical Translation Research Partnership. As a senior academic leader Catherine’s mission is to build a high performing student-centred culture within academic and professional teams and fostering engaging learning environments co-designed with strategic industry partners that prepare students for successful careers and support academic and professional staff in theirs.
Professor Itsiopoulos’ previous academic leadership roles include Pro Vice Chancellor of the College of Science, Health, Engineering and Education at Murdoch University, and she has held senior academic and research leadership roles at La Trobe University, University of Canberra, Deakin University, RMIT University, and the University of Melbourne. She has also held management roles in the health services sector and has extensive food industry partner networks and international committee roles in food and health. She is the Vice President of the Mediterranean Lifestyle Medicine Institute, a Board Member of the Australasian Society of Lifestyle Medicine, and Advisory Board Member of the British Society of Lifestyle Medicine and Chair of the Education Task Force for the World Lifestyle Medicine Organisation.
An established research leader in the field of nutrition and dietetics and international standing as a leader in Mediterranean diet studies with a personal chair as Professor of Nutrition and Dietetics. Catherine has raised approximately $11M in research grants across her career and recently led a successful $5M MRFF Post-Acute Sequelae of COVID-19 Grant to define person-centred co-designed models of care focused on lifestyle healthcare. Catherine is an extensively cited research scholar with > 150 scientific publications, book chapters and clinical guidelines on dietary management of chronic diseases and has published 4 Mediterranean Diet books (The Mediterranean Diet 2013, The Mediterranean Diet Cookbook 2015, The Heart Health Guide 2020, The Modern Mediterranean Diet 2023).