Academy Fellow

Muireann Irish is an expert in the cognitive neuroscience of ageing and dementia. Her innovative research program explores how cognitive processes change across the healthy adult lifespan and break down in neurodegenerative disorders. She is internationally recognised for her landmark studies demonstrating that, in parallel with difficulties remembering the past, people with dementia experience an impaired capacity to envisage the future. By articulating the cognitive and neural mechanisms driving these impairments, Irish’s work prompted a paradigm shift in the field and led to reconsideration of how episodic and semantic memory might work together in synergy. Irish has developed a suite of novel tools to probe these cognitive functions, which are now in use internationally. She has worked closely with aged care providers to translate her research findings into new educational toolkits to improve the care of people living with dementia, both at home and in the residential aged care sector.

To date Irish has published >160 publications in some of the most pre-eminent journals of her discipline, and has garnered >9000 citations. The calibre of her work is reflected in numerous awards and honours from national and international learned societies. In terms of cultural and social change, Irish is a keen advocate for the inclusion of people living with dementia in the research consultation process. Irish founded and is Chair of the Sydney Dementia Network Lived Experience Expert Advisory Panel (SDN-LEEAP) which provides a forum for people living with dementia to contribute to research policy and decision-making, and to provide input on research strategy and funding. She displays an exemplary commitment to promoting public understanding of dementia through media engagement, community talks, and school outreach activities. She has worked closely with the Academy of Social Sciences to create the new SHAPE Futures network to support EMCRs working in the social science disciplines in Australia.

President of the Australasian Cognitive Neuroscience Society

Fellow of the Royal Society of New South Wales

Vice Chancellor’s award for Research Excellence, The University of Sydney (2021)

Australian Psychological Society Media Award for Public Engagement with Psychological Science (2021)

International Science Council Early Career Research Award for the Oceania-Australia region (2021)

International Neuropsychological Society Early Career Award (2021)

Australian Academy of Science Gottschalk Medal (2020).

British Neuropsychological Society Elizabeth Warrington Prize (2019)

Cognitive Neuroscience Society Young Investigator Award (2019)

Australasian Cognitive Neuroscience Society Young Investigator Award (2017)

Science and Technology Australia ‘Superstar of STEM’ (2017)

L’Oréal-UNESCO International Rising Talent Award (2017)

Royal Society of NSW Edgeworth David Medal (2016) 

NSW Premier’s Prize for Science & Engineering Early Career Researcher of the Year (2016)

Academy of Social Sciences in Australia Paul Bourke Award for Early Career Research (2016)

L’Oréal-UNESCO Australia and New Zealand For Women in Science Fellowship (2015)

Elected to Memory Disorders Research Society (2015)

Australian Institute of Policy and Science Young Tall Poppy Science Award (2014)

International Neuropsychological Society Laird Cermak Award for Outstanding Research in Memory (2013)

1. IRISH M., Addis, D.R., Hodges, J.R., Piguet, O. (2012). Considering the role of semantic memory in episodic future thinking – evidence from semantic dementia. Brain, 135: 2178-91.

2. O’Callaghan, C., Shine, J.M., Andrews-Hanna, J.R., Hodges, J.R. IRISH (2019). Hippocampal atrophy and intrinsic brain network dysfunction relate to alterations in mind wandering in neurodegeneration. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 116: 3316-21.

3. Strikwerda-Brown, C., Andrews-Hanna, J.R., Grilli, M.D., IRISH, M. (2019). “All is not lost” – Rethinking the nature of memory and the self in dementia. Ageing Research Review, 54: 100932.

4. Renoult L., IRISH M., Moscovitch, M., Rugg, MD. (2019). From knowing to remembering: the semantic-episodic distinction. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 23(12): 1041-1057.

5. Shaw, S., El-Omar, H., Roquet, D., Hodges, J.R., Piguet, O., Ahmed, R., Whitton, A.E., IRISH M. (2021). Uncovering the prevalence and neural substrates of anhedonia in frontotemporal dementia. Brain. 144(5): 1551-1564.