Dr John Owen Osborne joined the School of Health in 2025 in a conjoint position as the Allied Health Research Coordinator, working to facilitate and develop collaborative allied health research between the University of the Sunshine Coast and the Sunshine Coast Hospital and Health Service.
Prior to his appointment at UniSC, John was a postdoctoral research fellow (2021-2024) and Associate Professor in Exercise Physiology and Sports Science (2022-) at the UiT The Arctic University of Norway, as well as the project leader of the Female Endurance Athlete Project at UiT. John’s research interests include investigating the objective and subjective influence of the menstrual cycle and hormonal contraceptives on the health and performance of female athletes.
John completed his PhD in exercise physiology at QUT in 2019, which investigated training and nutritional interventions, such as heat acclimation, that could potentially improve athletic performance in hot environmental conditions. He has experience teaching in a variety of different areas, such as exercise physiology, research methods and quantitative statistics, training adaptions, sports nutrition, public health and sports medicine, both in Australia and Norway.
Professional Membership
- Exercise and Sports Science Australia
- American College of Sports Medicine
- European College of Sport Science
Professional Social Media
Research areas
- Female athlete health, physiology, and performance
- Female endocrinology including menstrual cycle, menstrual dysfunction, and hormonal contraceptives
- Sports nutrition, supplementation, and eating disorders
- Neuromuscular performance and central fatigue
- Thermal physiology
- Athletic performance in extreme environments
John’s specialist areas of knowledge include female athlete performance and health, menstrual cycle disturbances, hormonal contraceptive use, and thermal exercise physiology.