Kun-Di is a final-year UQ-enrolled PhD candidate at Mater Research in Brisbane, with Principal Advisor A/Prof Paul Dawson. Driven by a profound commitment to maternal and neonatal health, Kun-Di’s academic journey is uniquely informed by extensive frontline experience as an operating theatre nurse in Taiwan. Kun-Di’s current research is highly translational, expanding upon the breakthrough findings of the SuPreme study: a landmark clinical study that identified a potential new cause for the high rates of adverse neurodevelopmental outcomes in preterm babies. While the clinical advances of this study were highly positive, the underlying mechanisms underlying adverse bone health in preterm infants remain largely unexplored. To solve this, Kun-Di’s PhD project has used a clinically relevant preterm animal model to investigate its relevance for investigating impaired skeletal development, which impacts more than 40% of infants born extremely preterm. Kun-Di is honoured to present recent findings today in a featured talk, "Preterm piglets as a translational large-animal model of osteopenia of prematurity," providing a model to test therapeutic approaches for improving preterm skeletal outcomes.