PhD Studentship - Intra-operative diagnosis of brain tumour margins
Applications are invited for a fully-funded 3-year PhD studentship based in the Department of Clinical Neurosciences at the University of Cambridge under the supervision of Professor Stephen Price and Dr Alexis Joannides starting October 2025.
Project description:
Gliomas are the commonest primary brain tumour and account for more average years of life loss than all common cancers. They are the commonest cause of cancer death in children and adults under 40 years old. There have been few new treatments for these patients making it imperative we optimise treatments we currently have.
Much of the improvement in survival with gliomas over the last 20 years has been down to surgery. We know surgery can kill more tumour than all other methods and that good resection of tumours can improve the efficacy of other treatments making improvements in surgery complementary to other improvements in treatment. Yet, surgery is the most toxic therapy. Our aim is to remove as much of the tumour as possible without causing neurological deficits.
We are beginning to understand which patients respond best to aggressive therapy and which do not need such aggressive surgery. Much of this is based on molecular subtypes predicting better oncological treatment responses. The problem is that we only find these subtypes some weeks after surgery. If we could diagnose the subtype of tumour intra-operatively, there may be an opportunity to tailor surgery based on these subtypes. Changing therapy for subtypes is an approach that has had significant impact on breast cancer survival.
This project will develop methods to look at how we can make intra-operative diagnosis in gliomas. It will focus on how we can obtain tissue intra-operatively and how we can analyse the tissue. Initial work will focus on assays for 2-hydroxyglutarate in tumour samples with IDH mutations. The project will involve working with scientsts and clinicians to obtain data from the operating theatre from patients with brain tumours.
This project will be based in the Cambridge Brain Tumour Imaging laboratory is a unique laboratory involved in using imaging and other techniques o guide and improve surgery.
This project is funded through the NIHR HealthTech Research Centre in Brain Injury (HRC) Fellowship Programme, which has been designed to support the research needs across its 5 themes: prevention & education, acute care & monitoring, restoration & rehabilitation, diagnostics and life-course. Central to the programme are the 7 core academic projects, across 4 academic partners.
In addition to the institutional training and education support, the HRC rolling educational programme will be delivered through a mixture of tutorials, workshops, web-based training resources, networking events and peer-led activities. This will equip fellows with unique considerations for developing HealthTech solutions, including modules in navigating the Regulatory and Commercial landscape, Essentials of Health Economics, Patient and Public Involvement and Engagement, How to Sell to the NHS, Research Inclusion, Research Design and Funding Support.
Funding
The studentship will cover the student's fees and stipend for three years at the current UOC rate for October 2025, £19,000.00 and Home fees of £10,356.00.
The studentships are available to students who qualify for UK Home fees.
Please check for Home eligibility (https://www.fee-status.admin.cam.ac.uk/) and entry requirements (https://www.postgraduate.study.cam.ac.uk/courses/directory/cvcnpdpcn/requirements)
All applications should be made online via the University's Applicant Portal for a PhD in PhD in Clinical Neurosciences. Deadline to apply is 30 April 2025. Please apply via the application portal - https://www.postgraduate.study.cam.ac.uk/courses/directory/cvcnpdpcn/apply
Applications should include academic transcripts, CV, statement of purpose and 2 references. An application is only complete when all supporting documents, including the 2 academic references, are submitted. It is the applicant's responsibility to ensure their referees submit their references before the closing date. Please also explain your motivation why you wish to pursue a PhD in this area, outline your research interests and background, and describe the qualities and experience you will bring to the role.
Any queries about the project, please contact Mita Brahmbhatt (NIHR HealthTech Research Centre in Brain Injury) at mb994@cam.ac.uk
Any questions regarding application processes, please contact the Education team on pgneurosci@medschl.cam.ac.uk.
Please quote reference ZE45542 and project title on your application and in any correspondence about this vacancy.
The University actively supports equality, diversity and inclusion and encourages applications from all sections of society.
The University has a responsibility to ensure that all employees are eligible to live and work in the UK.
PhD Studentship - Understanding chemical permeability and metabolism in gram-negative organisms
Project Summary:
Gram negative bacteria are major plant, animal, and human pathogens. There is an urgent unmet need to find new antibiotics against these pathogens (although little progress has been made in the last 40 years. Phenotypic screening has failed to find new compounds with novel mode of action while rational (structure-guided) antibiotic discovery has proved impossible in most cases because of a failure to understand the permeability, retention, and metabolism of chemicals. We have recently completed a systematic analysis of chemical retention and xenometabolism in mycobacteria (funding by the Gates Foundation) demonstrating that we can predict compound entry, retention and metabolism using ML approaches, for new unseen compounds to guide antibiotic discovery. The proposal will (i) modify these methods to map out permissive chemical space in a gram-negative bacteria, (ii) leverage existing mutant libraries to define molecular mechanisms of influx, efflux, and metabolism, and (iii) use this information to employ in silico screening and generative AI methods to create new antibiotics for soluble essential and vulnerable targets. The studentship will be co-supervised by Professor David Spring (Department of Chemistry).
This studentship is 3 years in length, from October 2025, and includes fees and maintenance for students eligible for Home fees. This studentship is part of BBRSC-Cambridge Biosciences Doctoral Training Partnership.
Applicants should hold (or expect to obtain) the equivalent of a UK 2.1 or higher in an undergraduate honours or Masters degree in a relevant subject.
To be appointed applicants must meet our minimum entry criteria which can be found at: https://www.postgraduate.study.cam.ac.uk/courses/directory/cvmdpdmed
For eligibility for home fees please check: https://www.postgraduate.study.cam.ac.uk/finance/fees/what-my-fee-status.
All applications should be made online via the University's Applicant Portal for a PhD in PhD in Medicine. Please apply via the application portal here - https://www.postgraduate.study.cam.ac.uk/courses/directory/cvmdpdmed
Please quote reference RC45508 on your application and in any correspondence about this vacancy.
The University actively supports equality, diversity and inclusion and encourages applications from all sections of society.
The University has a responsibility to ensure that all employees are eligible to live and work in the UK.
PhD Studentship - Developing a Novel Cotside Functional Brain Imaging System for Newborn Infants at high risk of Brain Injury.
Applications are invited for a fully-funded 3-year PhD studentship based in the Department of Clinical Neurosciences at the University of Cambridge under the supervision of Dr Topun Austin starting October 2025.
Project description
Acute brain injury in the newborn is a major cause of death and lifelong disability, including cerebral palsy, intellectual deficits, epilepsy and autism spectrum disorders with significant physical, psychological and economic burden on individuals, their families and society.
Globally 15 million newborn infants are born preterm, and it is the largest cause of death in children under 5 years. Preterm infants are at risk of acute brain injury at birth and are also at risk of neurodevelopmental problems as a consequence of being born too soon. In infants born at term, global hypoxia-ischaemia, perinatal stroke and traumatic brain injury result in an annual rate of acute brain injury of 3.5/1000 live births. Early accurate diagnosis is essential for timely management for these infants.
Structural brain imaging with cranial ultrasound (CUS) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) remain the traditional means of neurological assessment but are limited in their ability to reliably predict the extent or nature of injury and future impairment. While CUS is portable and repeated scans can be undertaken at the cotside, they lack the spatial resolution of MRI. MRI, however, requires transfer of sick and vulnerable infants to the MRI scanner and offers only a single snapshot of brain structure. The limitation of conventional imaging is due to the complex relationship between brain structure and function in the developing brain. This inability to accurately predict those infants who will go on to develop problems makes it extremely challenging to focus resources on those infants who would benefit from early intervention to improve their outcome.¿
This project aims to assess the functional integrity of the brain repeatedly at the cotside in neonates with acute brain injury by developing a novel portable dual-modality functional brain imaging system. The system combines the complimentary technologies of functional diffuse optical tomography (fDOT) and functional ultrasound (fUS). fDOT uses multi-channel near infrared light to produce high spatial and temporal resolution images of regional changes in cortical blood flow and oxygenation, reflecting brain activity throughout the cerebral cortex. fUS ultrasound waves are similar to CUS but using novel image reconstruction techniques and parallel computing technologies reaching 10,000 frames per second, enables very sensitive mapping of regional cerebral blood volume changes in deep cerebral structures. Combining these modalities will enable the first ever functional whole-brain imaging (cerebral cortex and deeper structures) at the cotside from newborn infants with acute brain injury.
The project will involve working with scientists and clinicians to obtain data from the cotside of both healthy and preterm infants as well as infants at risk of acute brain injury, from the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit in Cambridge. Working in collaboration with scientists and engineers both in Cambridge, but also University College London and INSERM, Paris, novel image reconstruction techniques will be developed to enable simultaneous optical and ultrasound data to be displayed.
This project is funded through the NIHR HealthTech Research Centre in Brain Injury (HRC) Fellowship Programme, which has been designed to support the research needs across its 5 themes: prevention & education, acute care & monitoring, restoration & rehabilitation, diagnostics and life-course. Central to the programme are the 7 core academic projects, across 4 academic partners.
In addition to the institutional training and education support, the HRC rolling educational programme will be delivered through a mixture of tutorials, workshops, web-based training resources, networking events and peer-led activities. This will equip fellows with unique considerations for developing HealthTech solutions, including modules in navigating the Regulatory and Commercial landscape, Essentials of Health Economics, Patient and Public Involvement and Engagement, How to Sell to the NHS, Research Inclusion, Research Design and Funding Support.
Funding
The studentship will cover the student's fees and stipend for three years at the current UOC rate for October 2025, £19,000.00 and Home fees of £10,356.00. The studentship is are open to students who are eligible for UK Home fees, however, if you are an international student, you can still apply and be considered, but you will need provide fees to cover the shortfall between Home and International fees.
Please check for Home Fees Eligibility (https://www.fee-status.admin.cam.ac.uk/) and Entry requirements (https://www.postgraduate.study.cam.ac.uk/courses/directory/cvcnpdpcn/requirements)
All applications should be made online via the University's Applicant Portal for a PhD in PhD in Clinical Neurosciences. Deadline to apply is 30 April 2025.
Please apply via the application portal here - https://www.postgraduate.study.cam.ac.uk/courses/directory/cvcnpdpcn/apply.
Applications should include academic transcripts, CV, statement of purpose and 2 references. An application is only complete when all supporting documents, including the 2 academic references, are submitted. It is the applicant's responsibility to ensure their referees submit their references before the closing date. Please also explain your motivation why you wish to pursue a PhD in this area, outline your research interests and background, and describe the qualities and experience you will bring to the role.
Any queries about the project, please contact Mita Brahmbhatt (NIHR HealthTech Research Centre in Brain Injury) on mb994@cam.ac.uk
Any questions regarding application processes please contact the Education team on pgneurosci@medschl.cam.ac.uk.
Please quote reference ZE45486 on your application and in any correspondence about this vacancy.
The University actively supports equality, diversity and inclusion and encourages applications from all sections of society.
The University has a responsibility to ensure that all employees are eligible to live and work in the UK.
NIHR HRC Studentship (Fixed Term)
Developing novel patient centred pathways, following acute presentation with mild traumatic brain injury
A fully funded PhD at the University of Cambridge, under the supervision of Dr Virginia Newcombe is available.
An estimated 60 million people worldwide each year sustain a traumatic brain injury of which 80%-90% are classified as a mild TBI (mTBI, concussion). Common causes include sporting injuries, falls and road traffic collisions.
Current clinical pathways in the ED focus on immediate needs. For example, using a CT scan of the brain to decide whether a patient needs surgery urgently for bleeding, and do not take into account potential longer term problems. Reducing ED waiting time may be important for patients as symptoms may worsen in the noisy environment. In addition, the number of people attending EDs for all health issues is rising, leading to longer waiting times.
There is also growing appreciation that "mild" is a misnomer as these patients may have ongoing functional, symptomatic and cognitive deficits that may benefit from further management. Our failure to prognosticate in this group means those with persisting problems are often lost to the ongoing care they need, and a presentation to ED could be a potential opportunity for stratification of need and signposting to appropriate onward care.
Rapidly evolving technologies offer potential to change the clinical pathway in EDs and improve care of people who have sustained a mTBI. For example a machine learning algorithm developed to detect TBI lesions on CT (BLAST-CT, developed by our group in collaboration with academics at Imperial College London) has the potential to assist emergency physicians to identify patients with normal scans. Blood biomarkers offer the potential to aid both diagnosis and prognostication in mTBI in the Emergency Department (ED) setting. Understanding the potential clinical utility of these technologies requires an understanding of existing care pathways, how these are enacted in practice, any inadvertent consequences, challenges in adoption and acceptance by both clinicians and patients, and where the information provided by them would make the most difference to both clinical decision making and ultimately patient outcomes.
This project will aim to understand how implementation such technologies may effect pathways. This work will involve scoping of existing care pathways and the impact on mTBI patient experience, including the identification of care gaps and unmet need. It will take advantage of data collected as part of the NIHR EME funded study BRAINS-TBI (Biomarkers for RAtional Investigation for Neurological decision Support in TBI, Chief Investigator Newcombe, NIHR159241); a UK multi-centre study of >2000 patients with mTBI, as well as other linked datasets, and consider health delivery models that could incorporate such innovations and technologies into routine practice. Specific details of the PhD project will be determined by the student's interests.
This project, home fees and stipends, is funded through the NIHR HealthTech Research Centre in Brain Injury (HRC) Fellowship Programme, which has been designed to support the research needs across its 5 themes: prevention & education, acute care & monitoring, restoration & rehabilitation, diagnostics and life-course. Central to the programme are the 7 core academic projects, across 4 academic partners.
In addition to the institutional training and education support, the HRC rolling educational programme will be delivered through a mixture of tutorials, workshops, web-based training resources, networking events and peer-led activities. This will equip fellows with unique considerations for developing HealthTech solutions, including modules in navigating the Regulatory and Commercial landscape, Essentials of Health Economics, Patient and Public Involvement and Engagement, How to Sell to the NHS, Research Inclusion, Research Design and Funding Support.
This studentship covers a stipend at the current UK Research and Innovation rate Home Fees and University Fees at the Home rate. International students will be considered if the shortfall in fees is covered from elsewhere
The studentship will be funded for three years from October 2025.
Closing date: 16th May 2025
To be appointed applicants must meet our minimum entry criteria which can be found at: https://www.postgraduate.study.cam.ac.uk/courses/directory/cvmdpdmed
For eligibility for home fees please check: https://www.postgraduate.study.cam.ac.uk/finance/fees/what-my-fee-status.
Applicants should hold (or expect to obtain) the equivalent of a UK 2.1 or higher in an undergraduate honours or Masters degree in a relevant subject.
All applications should be made online via the University's Applicant Portal for a PhD in Medicine. Applications should include academic transcripts, CV, statement of purpose and 2 references.
An application is only complete when all supporting documents, including the 2 academic references, are submitted. It is the applicant's responsibility to ensure their referees submit their references before the closing date.
Please also explain your motivation why you wish to pursue a PhD in this area, outline your research interests and background, and describe the qualities and experience you will bring to the role.
If you have any queries regarding the application process please contact the Clinical School HR Team via email cshrstaffhub@admin.cam.ac.uk.
For information about how your personal data is used as an applicant, please see the section on Applicant Data (https://www.hr.admin.cam.ac.uk/hr-staff/hr-data/applicant-data )on our HR web pages.
Please quote reference RC45467 on your application and in any correspondence about this vacancy.
The University actively supports equality, diversity and inclusion and encourages applications from all sections of society.
The University has a responsibility to ensure that all employees are eligible to live and work in the UK.
Krishnan-Ang PhD Scholarship in Urological Cancers
Project details
Clear cell renal cell carcinoma (ccRCC) accounts for 75% of renal cell cancers. It is defined by bi-allelic knockout of the VHL gene consistent with a classical "two-hit" model of carcinogenesis. We previously demonstrated through multiregional whole genome sequencing that the first hit, loss of chromosome 3p occurs 5 to 20 years prior to the second hit - either via a point mutation or epigenetic silencing of the VHL gene. There is a further delay of between 10 and 30 years prior to diagnosis. Over this time, the small cluster of two to three hundred cells grows to a clinically detectable cancer at least 1-2 cm in diameter, where longitudinal radiological data have revealed highly variable growth rates, typically between 2 and 3 mm per year.
With the increased detection of kidney cancers though cross-sectional imaging, there is an increasing need to effectively risk stratify tumours to those that require urgent treatment and those that can be managed in a more conservative manner.
This studentship aims to explore the factors that either promote or repress tumour growth over this long period of time. It will leverage a unique large-scale clinical cohort that has undergone comprehensive genomic profiling. The overall aim is to find ways of either preventing tumour progression or to predict how tumours might behave in the future. The precise composition of the PhD project will be defined based on the candidate's particular interests and the opportunities available. Analysis techniques can include:
- Whole genome and targeted duplex DNA sequencing
- Epigenetic sequencing
- Bulk RNA and spatial transcriptomics
- Radiomic analysis
- AI/ ML approaches to integrate the above data-streams
The project will be hosted in the Early Cancer Institute, Department of Oncology.
Candidate
We are looking for a highly motivated and enthusiastic individual capable of thinking and working independently. Applicants should have or shortly expect to obtain a minimum of a good upper second-class honours degree from a UK university, or an equivalent standard from an overseas university, in a relevant discipline.
Funding
Funding for this post is available for three years. Funding will cover the student's stipend and tuition fees at home or international rates.
This studentship is funded by generous donations from Tzo Tze Ang and Eashwar Krishnan, and will be awarded to an outstanding postgraduate student (home or international) undertaking a PhD in urological cancer research in the Department of Surgery.
The successful candidate will be known as a Krishnan-Ang Scholar and will join a cohort of postgraduate students already supported by the donors at Trinity College.
Eashwar and Tzo Tze were both undergraduates at Trinity: Eashwar read Natural Sciences (Matric. 1996) and Tzo Tze read Electrical & Information Sciences (Matric. 1997).
Eligibility
The funding for this studentship covers students accepted for a PhD in urological cancer research in the Department of Surgery.
How to apply
The deadline for applications is 3 March 2025
Apply via the University Application portal here for the PhD in Surgery programme. You should name the 'Krishnan-Ang Studentship for Cancer Research, Urology' in your application and list Mr Thomas Mitchell your prospective supervisor.
All prospective candidates are encouraged to contact Mr Thomas Mitchell at: tjm61@cam.ac.uk prior to applying, to discuss this opportunity in greater detail and refine the potential research proposal.
For application process queries, please contact clusterPG@medschl.cam.ac.uk
Interview and selection process
Interviews will take place in April 2025.
All candidates who have not been shortlisted will be informed of the outcome of their application.
Please quote reference RD45095 on your application and in any correspondence about this vacancy.
The University actively supports equality, diversity and inclusion and encourages applications from all sections of society.
The University has a responsibility to ensure that all employees are eligible to live and work in the UK.
