Available Projects
The CDT recruits students directly to projects. Applicants rank preferences; successful candidates will be assigned to a project based on fit and availability.
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| Project Title | Description | Supervisors | Research Theme | Keywords |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Designing surfaces to disrupt the spread of antibiotic resistance | Giorgio Volpe, Lena Ciric | Theme 1: Preventing Infections | Quantitative biophysics; Antimicrobial resistance; Horizontal gene transfer; Microfabrication; Surface engineering; Biofilms; Plasmid transfer; Fluorescence imaging. | |
| Targeting adaptive stress responses to overcome antifungal resistance | Duygu Dikicioglu, Eli Keshavarz-Moore | Theme 1: Preventing Infections | Antifungal resistance, fungal stress response, synthetic biology, Saccharomyces cerevisiae, Aspergillus nidulans, multidrug resistance, biofilms, biochemical engineering | |
| Smart surfaces that fight infection with enzymes and engineering | Michele Crotti, Martyna Michalska | Theme 1: Preventing Infections | Antimicrobial materials, biofilms, enzyme immobilisation, quorum sensing, nanofabrication, medical devices, AMR, hybrid surfaces, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Staphylococcus aureus | |
| AI-driven genome engineering of conjugative plasmids to disrupt antimicrobial resistance transmission | Darren Nesbeth, Eli Keshavarz-Moore | Theme 1: Preventing Infections | Conjugative plasmids, antimicrobial resistance, synthetic biology, genome engineering, large language models, bioprocess engineering, horizontal gene transfer, AI in biology | |
| Ultrasound-triggered nanoparticle therapies for targeted disruption of oral biofilms | Stavroula Balabani, Panagiota Angeli | Theme 1: Preventing Infections | Ultrasound-assisted drug delivery, dental biofilms, nanoparticle therapeutics, acoustic streaming, cavitation, endodontic infections, oral health, microfluidics, antimicrobial resistance | |
| Accelerating antimicrobial nanomedicine through the powerful trinity of microfluidics, automation, and AI. | Maximilian Besenhard, Maryam Parhizkar | Theme 1: Preventing Infections | Antimicrobial peptides, AMR, drug delivery, nanoparticle formulation, flow chemistry, high-throughput experimentation, automation and robotics, artificial intelligence | |
| Antibiotic-free surface engineering to prevent infections on orthopaedic implants | Manish K. Tiwari, Shervanthi Homer-Vanniasinkam | Theme 1: Preventing Infections | Orthopaedic implants, antimicrobial coatings, nanoengineering, slippery surfaces, biofilm prevention, AMR, medical device infections, surface characterisation | |
| Dual-amplification lateral flow diagnostics for ultrasensitive, power-free detection of RTIs and AMR | Guido Bolognesi, Thanh Nguyen | Theme 2: Diagnostics & Surveillance | Lateral flow assay, gold nanostars, plasmonic amplification, diffusiophoresis, respiratory tract infections, antimicrobial resistance, point-of-care diagnostics, microfluidics, nanodiagnostics | |
| Single-molecule nanopore sensors for real-time antibiotic quantification in clinical and environmental samples | Nicholas Bell, Kabir Husain | Theme 2: Diagnostics & Surveillance | Nanopore sensing, antibiotic detection, single-molecule analysis, aptamers, AMR surveillance, point-of-care diagnostics, environmental monitoring, biosensors | |
| Mining metagenomes to uncover next-generation antimicrobial enzymes | Lucy van Dorp, Joanne Santini | Theme 3: Novel Therapies | Phages; Metagenomics; Endolysins; Antimicrobials; Host prediction; CRISPR; Microbial ecology; Evolutionary genomics | |
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| Combining antibodies and antibiotics to combat one of the world’s most dangerous drug-resistant pathogens. | Jeremy Brown, Bart Hoogenboom | Theme 3: Novel Therapies | Acinetobacter baumannii; Monoclonal antibodies; Colistin; Antimicrobial resistance; Atomic force microscopy; RNA sequencing; Synergy; Therapeutics |
| Peptide-based disruption of mycobacterial defences | Alethea Tabor, Sanjib Bhakta | Theme 3: Novel Therapies | Mycobacteria, tuberculosis, antimicrobial peptides, cyclic peptides, drug resistance, peptide synthesis, mass spectrometry, cell wall metabolism, quorum sensing, combination therapy | |
| Harnessing bovine ultralong CDRs to discover novel antimicrobial peptide scaffolds. | Christine Orengo, Gorka Lasso Cabrera | Theme 3: Novel Therapies | Ultralong CDRs, antibodies, structural bioinformatics, deep learning, antimicrobial peptides, protein modelling, evolutionary analysis, therapeutic discovery | |
| Engineering polymeric nanoparticles for targeted mucosal mRNA vaccine delivery | Julia Rho, Pratik Gurnani | Theme 3: Novel Therapies | mRNA vaccines, mucosal delivery, polymer nanoparticles, high-throughput screening, respiratory infections, antimicrobial resistance, vaccine delivery systems, non-viral vectors | |
| AI-guided NMR screening to fast-track antiviral drug discovery against emerging viral threats | Finn Werner, Chris Waudby | Theme 3: Novel Therapies | RNA polymerase, antiviral drug discovery, NMR spectroscopy, machine learning, fragment screening, ASFV, cryo-EM, laboratory automation, lead optimisation |