Weekly research seminars provide a focus for research efforts in the School.
Research in the School has a broad scope ranging from clinical applications of nutrition including diet and obesity, to the development of new biophysical methods and theory in nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy. The School has a superb range of major instrumental facilities available to staff and postgraduate and Honours students. Particular strengths include proteomics, structural biology (x-ray and NMR), microbiology, metabolism, molecular biology, molecular genetics, and nutrition. Research efforts are strengthened by the presence of 25 post-doctoral research Fellows funded by the ARC, NHMRC, NIH, Royal Society of London, and the Wellcome Trust, amongst other bodies. In 2012 the School received in excess of $7.5 million in competitive research grants from government, industry and charity.
The school has recently organized itself to reflect its research and teaching strengths and priorities. There are five research disciplines: Biophysical Chemistry and Structural Biology, Microbiology, Molecular Biology and Genetics, Nutrition and Metabolism, and Proteomics and Biotechnology and a teaching discipline, Excellence in Learning, Assessment, Teaching and Evaluation.