Family Larsson-Rosenquist Foundation Fellowship Program
Family Larsson-Rosenquist Foundation Fellowship Program
The Fellowship offers two-year post-doctoral grants, financed by the Family Larsson-Rosenquist Foundation. The goal of the Fellowship is to build the next generation of leaders through hands-on, collaborative research, and international mentorship.
Fellows work at the intersection of multiple disciplines, focusing on human milk and/or small vulnerable newborns. As members of the GHMRC, they are embedded in an international mentorship and collaborative network that fosters scientific depth, cross-center integration, and sustained research impact.
Photo above: © Markus Forte, all rights reserved
Maheshwar Bhasin is the second Family Larsson-Rosenquist Foundation Fellow.
He was awarded the Fellowship in 2026 to support his first postdoctoral position.
Mahe’s project is a collaboration between the LRF CIBF and LRF NGN. It focuses on the critical period of brain development at birth, which coincides with the production of colostrum, the first form of human milk – rich in bioactive compounds that support processes such as myelination and synapse formation.
Around one in three newborns receives commercial milk formula within the first three days of life, potentially reducing exposure to colostrum during this formative window. Mahe is working to strengthen the evidence around colostrum by combining data from two multi-center birth cohorts and applying gold-standard tools to assess infant neurodevelopment.
His project aims to raise awareness of the potential role of colostrum in early brain development and to provide a foundation for future mechanistic, clinical, and translational research, particularly in vulnerable newborn populations.
Mahe’s investigation seeks to answer these questions:
Is exclusive colostrum feeding in the first days of life associated with improved neurodevelopmental outcomes at 24 months of age?
Do these associations hold across multiple birth cohorts when assessed using the gold-standard Bayley-III developmental assessment?
Are certain groups of infants, such as male infants, more likely to benefit from exclusive colostrum feeding in terms of neurodevelopmental outcomes?
Photo: The University of Western Australia
Fellowship Program
Bryony Davies is the first-ever Family Larsson-Rosenquist Foundation Fellow.
She was awarded the Fellowship in 2025 to support her PhD position.
Bryony’s project, conducted between LRF OCEHL and LRF MOMI CORE, investigates the biology of delayed secretory activation with a particular focus on mothers of small vulnerable newborns (SVNs).
Bryony's study aims to:
Establish hormone reference intervals to identify women at risk of delayed secretory activation.
Understand how hormones influence mammary gene expression, metabolism, and milk composition in the early postpartum period.
With Bryony’s fellowship, we are deepening understanding of delayed secretory activation in mothers of SVNs. This research will tackle three critical questions:
Do maternal disease and infant prematurity impair early postpartum lactation hormone secretion?
Does reduced mammary gland development contribute to delayed secretory activation?
What is the impact of delayed secretory activation on the nutrient and bioactive composition of colostrum and milk?
Photo: The University of Oxford