ion channel PhD Projects, Programs & Scholarships

PhD Research Projects are advertised opportunities to examine a pre-defined topic or answer a stated research question. Some projects may also provide scope for you to propose your own ideas and approaches.

This project does not have funding attached. You will need to have your own means of paying fees and living costs and / or seek separate funding from student finance, charities or trusts.

Our cells constantly sense and transport ions present in their environment. From embryonic development to epilepsy to heart disease to cancer, our cells’ ability to respond to changes in the ionic microenvironment is essential for healthy ageing.

Molecular Mechanisms of Receptor and Ion Channel Regulation in Pain and Inflammation

University of Reading
School of Pharmacy

Dr G Cottrell, Dr D Widera, Dr S Amadesi, Dr A McNeish

Applications accepted all year round

Funding Type

PhD Type

PhD Research Projects are advertised opportunities to examine a pre-defined topic or answer a stated research question. Some projects may also provide scope for you to propose your own ideas and approaches.

This project does not have funding attached. You will need to have your own means of paying fees and living costs and / or seek separate funding from student finance, charities or trusts.

"Receptors and ion channels are responsible for the transmission of signals across cellular membranes that regulate a plethora of biological and cellular functions.

Structural, kinetic and functional characterisation of ion channel function in the gal-3-fibrosome

University of Leicester
Department of Respiratory Sciences

Prof B Gooptu, Prof G Vuister

Application Deadline: 7 June 2020

Funding Type

PhD Type

Competition Funded PhD Project (European/UK Students Only)

PhD Research Projects are advertised opportunities to examine a pre-defined topic or answer a stated research question. Some projects may also provide scope for you to propose your own ideas and approaches.

This project is in competition for funding with other projects. Usually the project which receives the best applicant will be successful. Unsuccessful projects may still go ahead as self-funded opportunities.

4 Year PhD Studentship available to start September 2020. Fibrosis is a common ageing-associated process that affects all organs.

Ion channel regulation in models of neurodegeneration

University of Reading
School of Pharmacy

Dr M Dallas, Prof G J Stephens, Dr A Bithell

Applications accepted all year round

Funding Type

PhD Type

PhD Research Projects are advertised opportunities to examine a pre-defined topic or answer a stated research question. Some projects may also provide scope for you to propose your own ideas and approaches.

This project does not have funding attached. You will need to have your own means of paying fees and living costs and / or seek separate funding from student finance, charities or trusts.

Ion channels are important regulators of cellular physiology. There is now growing awareness that these proteins are invovled in pathological states, with relation to neurodegeneration voltage-gated potassium and voltage-gated calicum channels have been implicated.

Ion channel clustering in neuronal membranes

The University of Manchester
Faculty of Biology, Medicine and Health

Dr S M Prince, Prof R Ford

Applications accepted all year round

Funding Type

PhD Type

PhD Research Projects are advertised opportunities to examine a pre-defined topic or answer a stated research question. Some projects may also provide scope for you to propose your own ideas and approaches.

This project does not have funding attached. You will need to have your own means of paying fees and living costs and / or seek separate funding from student finance, charities or trusts.

The aim of the study is to investigate the organization of ion channels in the membranes of excitable cells by scaffold proteins, and to discover how the properties of the channels are modified by these interactions.

Ca2+ signalling in neurodegeneration and Alzheimer’s disease

University of Leeds
Faculty of Biological Sciences

Research Group: School of Biology

Prof I A Hope

Applications accepted all year round

Funding Type

PhD Type

Competition Funded PhD Project (European/UK Students Only)

PhD Research Projects are advertised opportunities to examine a pre-defined topic or answer a stated research question. Some projects may also provide scope for you to propose your own ideas and approaches.

This project is in competition for funding with other projects. Usually the project which receives the best applicant will be successful. Unsuccessful projects may still go ahead as self-funded opportunities.

Human variants of the ryanodine receptor, the main intracellular calcium ion channel, could be responsible for Alzheimer’s disease.

The mechanism of gating and transport of pentameric Magnesium ion channels

The University of Manchester
Faculty of Biology, Medicine and Health

Dr S M Prince, Prof R Ford

Applications accepted all year round

Funding Type

PhD Type

PhD Research Projects are advertised opportunities to examine a pre-defined topic or answer a stated research question. Some projects may also provide scope for you to propose your own ideas and approaches.

This project does not have funding attached. You will need to have your own means of paying fees and living costs and / or seek separate funding from student finance, charities or trusts.

Magnesium ions are a co-factor in many important biological processes particularly because of the requirement for Mg2+ in the hydrolysis of Adenosine tri-phosphate, the ubiquitous cellular energy source.

Structural insights into ligand binding and channel gating in ATP-gated P2X7 receptor

University of Leeds
Faculty of Biological Sciences

Research Group: School of Biomedical Sciences

Dr L H Jiang, Dr S Muench

Applications accepted all year round

Funding Type

PhD Type

PhD Research Projects are advertised opportunities to examine a pre-defined topic or answer a stated research question. Some projects may also provide scope for you to propose your own ideas and approaches.

This project does not have funding attached. You will need to have your own means of paying fees and living costs and / or seek separate funding from student finance, charities or trusts.

P2X7 receptor, belonging to the ATP-gated ion channel P2X receptor family, exhibits distinct functional and pharmacological properties that are crucial for its role in innate immunity and inflammatory diseases and cancers (Jiang et al., 2013; Caseley et al., 2014; Roger et al., 2014; Wei et al., 2018).

Targeting mitochondrial dynamics to prevent Parkinson’s disease

University of Leeds
Faculty of Biological Sciences

Prof A Sivaprasadarao, Dr R.S. Bon

Application Deadline: 1 June 2020

Funding Type

PhD Type

Funded PhD Project (UK Students Only)

PhD Research Projects are advertised opportunities to examine a pre-defined topic or answer a stated research question. Some projects may also provide scope for you to propose your own ideas and approaches.

This research project has funding attached. It is only available to UK citizens or those who have been resident in the UK for a period of 3 years or more. Some projects, which are funded by charities or by the universities themselves may have more stringent restrictions.

A common feature of Parkinson’s disease (PD) is the presence of alpha-synuclein protein aggregates in the brains of affected patients.

Unravelling the dynamics of lipid bilayers and membrane proteins and their reaction to toxins and viral infection on the single molecule level using label-free microscopy.

Cardiff University
Cardiff School of Physics and Astronomy

Prof W W Langbein, Prof P Borri, Dr MY Young, Dr O Castell

Application Deadline: 5 June 2020

Funding Type

PhD Type

Competition Funded PhD Project (European/UK Students Only)

PhD Research Projects are advertised opportunities to examine a pre-defined topic or answer a stated research question. Some projects may also provide scope for you to propose your own ideas and approaches.

This project is in competition for funding with other projects. Usually the project which receives the best applicant will be successful. Unsuccessful projects may still go ahead as self-funded opportunities.

Approximately 30% of the proteins in a cell are membrane proteins, which represent more than 60% of all known drug targets and play a critical role in both infection and immunity.

Direct characterisation of TRPC channel dynamics triggered by drug-like modulators using high-speed atomic force microscopy

University of Leeds
School of Physics and Astronomy

Research Group: Molecular and Nanoscale Phsyics

Dr G Heath

Applications accepted all year round

Funding Type

PhD Type

Competition Funded PhD Project (European/UK Students Only)

PhD Research Projects are advertised opportunities to examine a pre-defined topic or answer a stated research question. Some projects may also provide scope for you to propose your own ideas and approaches.

This project is in competition for funding with other projects. Usually the project which receives the best applicant will be successful. Unsuccessful projects may still go ahead as self-funded opportunities.

The rapid expansion in the structural understanding of membrane proteins through recent progress in electron microscopy and X-ray crystallography is leading to an ever greater need for techniques which provide high temporal resolution dynamics.

Molecular Modelling of P2X receptor agonism and antagonism

University of Leicester
Molecular and Cell Biology

Dr R Schmid

Application Deadline: 7 June 2020

Funding Type

PhD Type

Competition Funded PhD Project (European/UK Students Only)

PhD Research Projects are advertised opportunities to examine a pre-defined topic or answer a stated research question. Some projects may also provide scope for you to propose your own ideas and approaches.

This project is in competition for funding with other projects. Usually the project which receives the best applicant will be successful. Unsuccessful projects may still go ahead as self-funded opportunities.

P2X receptors (P2XRs) form a family of ligand-gated ion channels activated upon binding of extracellular ATP (for review see [1]).

Myocardial biology with a specific focus on the mechanisms underlying cardiac fibrosis and atrial fibrillation

University of Oxford
Radcliffe Department of Medicine

Dr S Reilly, Prof C Redwood, Assoc Prof M Lei

Application Deadline: 24 July 2020

Funding Type

PhD Type

PhD Research Projects are advertised opportunities to examine a pre-defined topic or answer a stated research question. Some projects may also provide scope for you to propose your own ideas and approaches.

This project does not have funding attached. You will need to have your own means of paying fees and living costs and / or seek separate funding from student finance, charities or trusts.

Cardiac fibrosis is a hallmark histological feature of structural changes in the myocardium associated with virtually all cardiac diseases (e.g., heart failure, hypertension, atrial fibrillation and myocarditis).

Development of Spin based Transistors with 2D Materials

University of York
Department of Electronic Engineering

Research Group: Intelligent Systems and Nanoscience

Prof Y Xu

Applications accepted all year round

Funding Type

PhD Type

PhD Research Projects are advertised opportunities to examine a pre-defined topic or answer a stated research question. Some projects may also provide scope for you to propose your own ideas and approaches.

This project does not have funding attached. You will need to have your own means of paying fees and living costs and / or seek separate funding from student finance, charities or trusts.

Over the past few decades, size of transistors has been tremendously reduced from a few centimetres to a few tens of nanometres. This trend in down scaling the device size has almost reached its ultimate physical limitation, challenging Moore’s Law which has been valid for almost half a century.