Rotation PhD Programme in Plant and Microbial Sciences

4-year multi-disciplinary PhD opportunity in genetics, genomics, cell biology, microbiology, molecular biology, crop science, biological chemistry, applied mathematics, computational and systems biology.

Our long-running flagship Rotation PhD programme is aimed at supporting the most promising independent students to undertake in-depth postgraduate training. The programme involves three internationally respected research institutions in Norwich, UK: the John Innes Centre, The Sainsbury Laboratory and Earlham Institute. The programme is designed to attract outstanding applicants with excellent academic records who show potential for research at the highest level. Special features of the programme include empowerment to choose three research topics and supervisors for research rotations in the first year.

You will undertake three 10-week research projects with different supervisors located in any of the three partner institutes. You will learn from your fellow rotation students in this multidisciplinary programme through a fortnightly journal club and research presentations at the end of each rotation.

The programme is renowned for its academic excellence and ground-breaking research. The empowerment of the student on the rotation programme instils independence of thought right from the start.

You will be mentored by the programme tutor, a senior academic and a rotation student from the previous year-group. You will rapidly become familiar with a wide range of scientific approaches that encompass genetics, genomics and cell biology through to microbiology, molecular biology, crop science, biological chemistry, applied mathematics, computational biology and systems biology. The objective of the first eight months is for you to gain broad technical and theoretical training prior to the selection of a main research project and supervisor leading to the submission of the highest quality PhD thesis within a total of four years. You will be registered for your degree at the University of East Anglia.

Funding

The scholarship is open to UK, EU and international applicants. It covers a stipend of £17,553pa (2017/8 level) plus university registration fees and a generous allowance for research consumables/training.

Further Information

www.jic.ac.uk/training-careers/training/postgraduate-research/rotation-phd/

Apply To Us

The deadline for receipt of applications is Thursday 30th November 2017. Interviews for short-listed candidates will be held on Wednesday 17th January 2018. Candidates unable to travel to Norwich on this date will be interviewed by video/telephone on Tuesday 16th January 2018.

www.jic.ac.uk/training-careers/training/postgraduate-research/application-help-and-guidance/

Programme Directors: Dr Stephen Bornemann, Professor Sophien Kamoun and Dr Wilfried Haerty.

The Rotation PhD Programme is supported by the John Innes Foundation together with the participating institutes.