Dr Y Wang, Prof N Lemoine
No more applications being accepted
Competition Funded PhD Project (European/UK Students Only)
About the Project
Our CRUK funded Clinical Research Fellowship provides up to 3 years’ support for clinically qualified professionals to undertake research training within Barts Cancer Institute.
This training programme, part of a multimillion pound award from CRUK, aims to develop a cohort of medically qualified scientists equipped both intellectually and technically to conduct the highest quality research on cancer.
The scheme is designed to accommodate the dual clinical-research training career path by allowing fellows to spend up to 20% of theor time on NHS sessions
Fellows will be appointed as a Clinical Research Fellow with the Institute and will be required to register for a PhD, based on research undertaken during the fellowship.
Project Outline:
Oncolytic viruses (OVs) have been developed as a new approach for the treatment of cancer that is resistant to standard therapies. Although the clinical safety profiles are encouraging, the efficacy of oncolytic viruses as single agent therapy has been limited. Furthermore delivering TOVs systemically is extremely important for unmet medical needs, such as treating metastatic or inaccessible pancreatic cancer.
Vaccinia virus (VV) has several biological properties that make it ideally suited for intravenous delivery and subsequent amplification of transgenes within tumours. One of which is that VV can produce a special form, called Extracellular Enveloped Virion (EEV). EEV is coated with host cellular proteins and relatively quiet antigenically, and can antagonise innate (complement) and adaptive (neutralising antibodies) systemic host defences, as well as permit widespread and long-distance dissemination within the host. However, EEV is produced only in low numbers by most strains of VV (<1% of all infectious progeny).
We have recently developed a novel mutant of vaccinia virus, resulting in 10-30-fold more infectious EEV produced than its parental virus and demonstrated a superior anti-tumour efficacy in vivo compared to the backbone vector. The potential fellow will arm this new generation VV with immune-modulatory molecules, assess the cytotoxicity and tumour-specific replication of these novel viruses in vitro. Following this, safety and efficacy studies will be performed in several immuno-competent tumour models in vivo. These data will provide proof of concept for translation of the agent into clinical trials at the end of the fellowship
For more information, including details on how to apply please see our website:
http://www.bci.qmul.ac.uk/study-with-us/postgraduate-research/cruk-funded-clinical-research-fellowships-2017-18
Funding Notes
The fellowship will cover tuition fees for PhD registration up to the Home/EU rate.
If you are considered an overseas applicant for fee purposes, you will be responsible for paying the difference between the Home/EU and overseas rate.
You will also receive a salary commensurate with your current experience.
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