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Four-Year Funded Studentship. Application Deadline: 2nd May 2025
Cell Death Mechanisms to Inform Hypofractionated Proton Therapy
Primary Supervisor: Professor Gary Royle
Introduction
A four-year funded PhD Studentship is available in the UCL Department of Medical Physics and Biomedical Engineering. Funding will be at least the UCL minimum stipend rate. Details can be found here.
The successful candidate will join our Research Degree in Medical Physics (application portal here), and benefit from the activities and events organised by the department.
The PhD will be aligned with the CRUK City of London Radition Research Centre.
Project Background
Proton therapy, an advanced form of radiation treatment for cancer, is delivered over multiple days in dose ‘fractions’. Typically the treatment takes between 25 and 35 days. Hypofractionation is a technique in which the dose is delivered in far fewer fractions; this can improve therapeutic response, improves access for patients to advanced proton therapies, and has much less impact on the patients’ lives. The optimal radiation dose delivered each day, and therefore the required number of fractions, is governed primarily by the mechanisms of radiation-induced cell death in the tumour and surrounding normal tissue. Current clinical practice relies on models based on x-ray treatments and do not account for biological variation between patients or tumour heterogeneity. Consequently hypofractionated treatments are not in routine clinical use in proton therapy. Furthermore, the cell death mechanisms induced by proton radiation are not fully understood and would have implications for the design of proton-drug combination studies.
Research aims
This project will study the various cell death mechanisms induced following proton irradiation, introduce state of the art biological assays that can be optimally applied, explore methods to develop suitable tumour models from patient derived cells, and determine the effect of dose fraction schedules. A range of tumour types will be explored with the conclusions used to inform clinical trials.
Experimental work will be based at the cancer biology labs of the UCL Cancer Institute and radiation worked performed at both UCL’s preclinical irradiation facilities and the UCL Hospital proton therapy centre.
The project will be supervised by a cross-disciplinary team: Professor Gary Royle (cancer engineering), Professor Tariq Enver (stem cell biology), Professor Maria Hawkins (radiation oncology) and Dr Kate Ricketts (cancer physics).
Person Specification and Requirements
• This studentship is only open to Home Fee paying candidates. More information about fee status criteria can be found here.
• Candidates with backgrounds in biological sciences and be enthusiastic about cancer research.
• Candidates should hold a UK (or international equivalent) first or upper-second Bachelor’s degree.
Funding
This is a full studentship available to:
• Home fee applicants. Overseas fee payers will be considered but they must have secured a separate scholarship that can cover the fee difference between Home Fee and the Overseas fee.
The successful student will receive a stipend starting from at least the UCL minimum (£21,237 in 2024/25) as well as the cost of tuition fees for home fee students (£6,035 in 2024/25).
The stipends awarded to PhD students at UCL are tax free and incur no income tax or national insurance contributions. The amount received increases each year over the duration of the studentship.
UCL’s fee eligibility criteria can be found by following this link.
Application Process
How to Apply
Please complete the following steps to apply:
• Send an expression of interest and current CV to g.royle@ucl.ac.uk and medphys.pgr@ucl.ac.uk, quoting Project Code 23043 in the email subject line.
• Make a formal application via the UCL application portal: Apply | Prospective Students Graduate - UCL – University College London. Please select the programme code ‘Medical Physics RRDMPHSING01 ’ and enter Project Code 23043 under ‘Name of Award 1’
• If shortlisted, candidates will be invited for an interview.
Application Deadline and Timeline
The deadline for this application is Friday 2nd May 2025.
• After the deadline, all applicants that expressed their interests and specified Project 23043 in their Portico application will be considered for interview.
• Candidates will normally be invited for interview within three weeks of the deadline. If you have not been contacted within this time-period, you have unfortunately not been successful in being shortlisted.
• The interview panel will normally consist of the supervision team on the project.
• Note that applications without specifying the project they are applying for and/or making a formal Portico application will be automatically rejected.
• If you are offered and accept a studentship position, a formal UCL Offer of Admission will be sent to you as well as an offer of studentship funding.