Talented and motivated students passionate about doing research are invited to apply for this PhD position. The successful applicant will join the Crick PhD Programme in September 2022 and will register for their PhD at one of the Crick partner universities (King’s College London).
This 4-year joint Crick PhD studentship is offered in the labs of Dr Eachan Johnson and Dr Jeannine Hess, based at the Francis Crick Institute (the Crick).
As soon as new antimicrobial drugs are discovered and used in the clinic, pathogenic bacteria inevitably evolve resistance, driving an unsustainable cycle threatening the twentieth century's improvements to public health. Antibiotics revolutionized modern medicine, but previously curable infections once again threaten millions of lives. To tackle this emerging crisis, we need to discover inhibitors of new cellular targets faster than bacteria can evolve resistance, but conventional antimicrobial drug development too often either relies on minor modifications of known antibiotics to generate only marginally different “me-too drugs” or screening of large chemical libraries which yield repeated rediscovery of inhibitors of the same cellular targets.
This interdisciplinary PhD project aims to significantly advance approaches to antimicrobial discovery, specifically addressing drug resistance in tuberculosis, which is a global top-10 cause of death and is caused by Mycobacterium tuberculosis[1]. It combines the Hess lab’s (King’s) expertise in biological inorganic chemistry, fragment-based drug discovery, and biophysics with the Johnson lab’s (Crick) expertise in chemical genomics, M. tuberculosis biology, and computation to characterise the bioactivity of large, new swathes of chemical space, so that new collections of chemical inhibitors with novel cellular targets in M. tuberculosis might be rapidly identified. Based on consultation with the candidate and their interests, this work could combine rational fragment-based drug design, computational curation of focussed fragment libraries[2], M. tuberculosis phenomics[3] of organometallic compounds[4], biochemical validation of inhibitor mechanisms of action[5], and activity-based protein profiling.
This project will provide opportunities to develop skills in chemical synthesis, biophysical techniques, bacterial genetics, microbiology, infection biology, high-throughput compound and genetic screening, chemical biology, quantitative biology, computational chemistry, and machine learning. There is also potential for collaboration with multiple groups at the Crick and other institutions.
Candidate background
We are looking for candidates with a background in chemistry or chemical biology with an interest in infectious disease, microbiology, quantitative biology or systems biology. A background in computational chemistry or biology is a bonus, but enthusiasm for developing these skills is essential. The candidate should be creative, have excellent communication skills, is enthusiastic to work collaboratively in a multidisciplinary research area and is interested in learning and adopting relevant techniques to achieve the research goals.
Applicants should hold or expect to gain a first/upper second-class honours degree or equivalent in a relevant subject and have appropriate research experience as part of, or outside of, a university degree course and/or a Masters degree in a relevant subject.
APPLICATIONS MUST BE MADE ONLINE VIA OUR WEBSITE (ACCESSIBLE VIA THE ‘INSTITUTION WEBSITE’ LINK ABOVE) BY 12:00 (NOON) 11 November 2021. APPLICATIONS WILL NOT BE ACCEPTED IN ANY OTHER FORMAT.
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