Auckland University researchers also gained about $25.6 million in the latest HRC funding round, in which about $65 million was allocated.
Allan Herbison, the director of the Otago University Centre for Neuroendocrinology, and two other principal investigators, Istvan Abraham and Rebecca Campbell, have gained a new $4.84 million programme grant to tease out the mechanisms underlying the brain's control of fertility.
HRC officials said this research was "helping to provide the foundations for designing new therapies to help infertile couples and safer, more effective, contraceptives".
Prof Herbison was delighted to have gained the five-year funding but said the outcome was also "bittersweet", because he knew many colleagues also striving to undertake high quality research at Otago University and elsewhere had not gained funding, because of the limited research funding available.
This funding would enable Otago researchers to continue to be "the world leaders" in studying the brain's control of fertility.
It was estimated that up to 25% of couples in New Zealand sought medical advice for problems related to infertility and it could have a "massive" effect on people's lives, he said.
Otago University's Dunedin Multidisciplinary Health and Development Research Unit, which has won an international reputation with ground-breaking insights into health issues, has gained a $5,665,540 programme extension, enabling it to pursue its study of "ageing and risk for chronic disease".
Unit director Richie Poulton, who is attending a conference in Canada, commented by email that he was "thrilled about this strong endorsement of our research, particularly in these tough economic times".
HRC officials have noted that a "staggering" 30% of children in New Zealand were already overweight or obese at 2-4 years of age.
Rachael Taylor, of the Otago medicine department, has gained $1,198,083 in project funding to follow up, to 5 years of age, an earlier HRC-funded Prevention in Overweight in Infancy (POI) study.
This had sought to determine whether extra information and support for families with new babies could improve eating and activity, and reduce excessive weight gain in infancy.
A second project led by Barry Taylor ($901,013) will investigate other key POI-related issues.
Anthony Kettle, of Otago's Christchurch campus ($4,242,985), and Philippa Howden-Chapman, of the Wellington campus ($3,749,138), gained programme extensions.
Richard Blaikie, the Otago deputy vice-chancellor, research and enterprise, said this "welcome funding", gained in the very competitive funding round, would allow world-class Otago researchers to "make a real difference to New Zealanders' health and well-being."
Otago researchers also gained the following new project funding: Brian Darlow, paediatrics, Christchurch, $1,150,400; Brian Hyland, physiology, $1,166,489; Kypros Kypri, preventive and social medicine, $263,908; Peter Herbison, preventive and social medicine, $970,247; Beverley Lawton, Wellington, $1,192,365; Stephen Robertson, Women's and Children's Health, $1,199,327; Emerging Researcher First Grants, each about $150,000: Melanie Bussey, Tamlin Conner, Dione Healey, Matloob Husain.
