PhD Research Project: Mass spectrometric approaches to identifying metabolic biomarkers of disease

Do you have a strong interest in the development and application of chromatography, mass spectrometry and associated bioinformatics tools to be applied in metabolism studies to improve diagnosis of infection and disease in humans? Do you want to develop your research and transferable skills between academia and a national research institute? If so, a Defence Science and Technology Laboratory sponsored PhD opportunity is available in the School of Biosciences at The University of Birmingham in the group of Dr Warwick Dunn.

The 3-year studentship is available and is funded by EPSRC in collaboration with the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (Dstl). Dstl operates to ensure that innovative science and technology contribute to the defence and security of the UK. Joint supervision will be led by Dr Warwick Dunn at the University of Birmingham with Dr Caroline Rowland at Dstl and Prof. Mark Viant at the University of Birmingham.

This exciting and challenging PhD project lies at the interface of bioanalytical chemistry, bioinformatics and human biomedical research and is available from September 2017 in the group of Dr Warwick Dunn (Senior Lecturer in Metabolomics and Director of Mass Spectrometry at Phenome Centre Birmingham). Warwick’s research focuses on two distinct and related areas; (1) the development of innovative instrumental and software tools and resources to be applied for non-targeted and targeted studies of mammalian metabolomes and (ii) biomedical/clinical research focused on stratified medicine and understanding the molecular mechanisms of human ageing and diseases associated with endocrinology, immunology and inflammation, cardiovascular diseases, renal diseases and complications of pregnancy. One specific area of research focuses on improved tools and methodologies for comprehensive profiling of complex mammalian metabolomes and in the chemical identification of all metabolites detected; this is the focus of this PhD studentship.
The research to be performed in this PhD project will focus on (1) developing innovative sample preparation, instrumental and computational workflows to enable the study of small volume mammalian tear samples and (2) application of the developed workflow to the study of Dstl-focused biological questions. The challenge of analysing tear samples is the very low volume available (1-2µL) and the low concentration of metabolites present. You will develop and optimise workflows for sample extraction (applying liquid-liquid extraction and SPE), nanoLC-MS (applying different chromatographic phases) and MSn data acquisition to allow a more comprehensive metabolic study of mammalian tears. The successful student will undergo a placement project at Dstl which will be based on transitioning the techniques and methods for mass spectrometry analysis of tears and applying these techniques to experimental tear samples derived from projects running in the ‘Protecting our People’ programme. The placement project will last for a minimum of 3 months and will be based at Dstl’s Porton Down site.
The PhD will provide Specialist Training: in LC, MS and extraction chemistry; in metabolomics, and more broadly analytical biomedical sciences; The PhD will also provide Transferable Skills acquired through the extensive courses in the Biosciences Graduate Research School. This training will be truly multidisciplinary to enrich the student experience. We seek an exceptional candidate with an undergraduate or Masters degree (can be pending) in fields such as bioanalytical chemistry, analytical toxicology or environmental forensics.

For further details on the research in Dunn’s laboratory, including relevant research papers, visit:
http://www.birmingham.ac.uk/schools/biosciences/staff/profile.aspx?ReferenceId=53168
 

Funding Notes

Fully funded studentships are only available to UK nationals. See EPSRC's requirements at: https://www.epsrc.ac.uk/skills/students/coll/icase/