Development and evaluation of micro-environmentally responsive drug and vaccine therapies to treat cancer

Therapies to treat cancer are given systemically and often have off-target toxicities which limit the doses at which they can be given and therefore their efficacy.

This PhD project will build upon previous work carried out by my research team to develop such targeted and responsive drug and vaccine therapies. The project will involve developing and characterizing environmentally responsive sustained release therapies and then investigating how the different therapies impact on the type and quality of cytotoxic responses generated both in vitro and in vivo.

This project combines aspects of chemistry, pharmaceutical sciences and immunology. The overall direction of the project will depend on the strenghts of the candidate, for example they may wish it to be more immunological or with more emphasis in the area of chemistry or formulation. The candidate for this project will however gain expertise in a variety of areas.