The University of the West of Scotland (UWS) is seeking to attract a PhD candidate of outstanding ability and commitment to join its vibrant and growing programme of internationally excellent research. The successful applicant will receive an annual stipend (currently £15,609 per annum for three years) and payment of tuition fees (current value £4,500 per annum for 3 years).
This project will investigate a transformative alternative modality of PET imaging: one which combines the imaging of cancerous tissue with simultaneous treatment of the tumour with the use of very-high energy electrons accelerated using a laser-wakefield accelerator. There is a growing body of evidence that the lifetime of positronium is sensitive to oxygen levels within biological tissue. A lack of oxygen is often associated with an increased tendency to metastatic progression and can indicate that a tumour is more resistive to radiotherapy. This technique will permit discrimination between healthy and cancerous tissue based on oxygen levels.
The successful candidate will join the Nuclear Physics Research group of the University of the West of Scotland and work within an international collaboration performing experiments at the Scottish Centre for the Application of Plasma-based Accelerators (SCAPA) in Glasgow and at CERN in Geneva. This project will also involve significant use of the Monte-Carlo simulation toolkit Geant4.
The studentship is open to UK citizens and EU applicants with pre-settled or settled status, it is also open to international applicants if they can cover the difference between Home and International fees for the duration of the programme of study. Candidates should hold a first- or second-class honours degree from a university in the United Kingdom in a relevant discipline. Please quote the Project Reference number above when submitting your research proposal.
In the first instance, any informal enquiries and applications to these competitive studentships should be made by email to Dr David O'Donnell ([Email Address Removed]). Successful applicants will be asked to submit the application through the UWS online system (https://www.uws.ac.uk/study/research-degrees/admissions-application/).
Closing date 30th June 2021
Interview July 2021
Start date 1st October 2021
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