PhD Studentship: Understanding and enhancing the physiological resilience of older adults to improve health-span: a focus on skeletal muscle.

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Drugs
Location:  UK Different
Closing Date:  Saturday 20 April 2024
Reference:  MED2003

Principal supervisors: 

PhD 1 – Prof Philip Atherton (Faculty of Drugs) – [email protected]  

PhD 2 – Prof Paul Greenhaff (Faculty of Life Sciences) – [email protected]  

PhD 3 – Prof Bethan Phillips (Faculty of Drugs) – [email protected]  

Funded by the Dunhill Medical Belief (https://dunhillmedical.org.uk/ ) as one in every of their A number of PhD Studentship Awards, we have now three fully-funded (stipend at UKRI charges, PhD charges (for UK nationals solely) and analysis prices) three-year full-time PhD’s accessible, every to begin on the first October 2024. 

Every of those initiatives relies across the widespread theme of enhancing the physiological resilience of older adults, with a particular deal with skeletal muscle.

Programme description: Lack of resilience describes enhanced vulnerability to, and impaired restoration from stress occasions when in comparison with a strong [youthful/healthy] state; and is often encountered with advancing age. With ageing populations around the globe, and the related rise in years spent in ill-health, there’s an pressing want to know the mechanisms underpinning this lack of physiological resilience, and potential methods to mitigate these declines. Though a latest nationwide GIRFT (Getting It Proper First Time) report means that bettering frailty administration may save the NHS >£600-million/yr, furthering understanding of the organic mechanisms driving lowered resilience to tell on precision mitigation methods (i.e., for the fitting folks on the proper time) may in reality have a a lot greater affect. This affect would favour not solely on healthcare programs but in addition older people, their assist networks and society as an entire. Proof means that skeletal muscle deterioration, together with metabolic and purposeful decline, is a core driver of lowered resilience in older adults each with and with out illness. Certainly, skeletal muscle weak point is on the fore of each frailty (the medical time period encompassing lack of resilience) and sarcopenia (age-associated losses of muscle mass and performance) definitions. A devastating consequence of lowered resilience is that the time folks spend in good well being (their health-span) is now a lot shorter than total lifespan; a problem that we goal to assist deal with by way of this assortment of PhD’s.

PhD descriptions:

PhD 1 – Drug repurposing is an rising avenue of analysis within the area of Geroscience; a area whose acknowledged goal is to “speed up reseach into the essential mechanisms driving ageing which may result in improved medical interventions”. Based mostly on the College of Nottingham Medical Faculty at Derby (UNMSD; Royal Derby Hospital Centre), this PhD is focussed on exploring the affect of an already-licensed mechanistic goal of rapamycin (mTOR) inhibitor (which has been proven to attenuate sarcopenia in animal fashions of ageing) on muscle development and performance in each community-dwelling older adults and orthogeriatric sufferers. Outcomes from this PhD will inform on the potential of mTOR inhibition to reinforce the resilience of older adults, not solely in relation to skeletal muscle but in addition different organ programs for which beneficial pre-clinical information is rising (i.e., the immune system). As is the case for all of those PhD’s, the profitable candidate will be taught a wealth of abilities regarding human physiology research/medical trials and state-of-the-art wet-lab strategies.

PhD 2 – Sturdy proof relating to the organic mechanisms chargeable for the well being advantages of bodily exercise, and the detrimental impacts of inactivity is missing. This PhD will goal to handle the long-standing debate surrounding the position of ordinary bodily exercise ranges in driving ageing processes in a number of organs, with a selected deal with skeletal muscle. The profitable candidate shall be built-in right into a multidisciplinary crew dovetailing magnetic resonance imaging, biotechnology and human physiology experience, which is able to allow a complete array of endpoints to be quantified over the course of a 6 month managed bodily exercise intervention. A selected focus of this PhD undertaking shall be understanding the contribution of metabolic and physiological adjustments in skeletal muscle with altered bodily exercise ranges. This PhD will present distinctive coaching in metabolic physiology and shall be primarily based throughout 3 websites, the Sir Peter Mansfield Imaging Centre and Queens Medical Centre (QMC) on the College of Nottingham College Park campus and the UNMSD. 

PhD 3 – Along with rehabilitation, which has lengthy been employed as technique to reinforce restoration from medical stress occasions, there’s burgeoning medical and analysis curiosity in prehabilitation, an strategy employed to arrange people for these occasions. Based mostly on the College of Nottingham Medical Faculty at Derby (UNMSD; Royal Derby Hospital Centre), this PhD will contemplate the significance of, and strategies for the preservation of muscle mass and performance in older affected person cohorts. With elective surgical procedure a transparent and customary instance of a stress occasion encountered by older adults, and recognising that physiological resilience is not only preparedness for stress occasions but in addition the power to recuperate from them, this PhD will deal with practicable pre- and rehabilitation methods in older surgical sufferers. Exploring the interplay between novel contractile methods and dietary consumption, outcomes from this PhD will present an evidence-base for methods to be carried out as an adjuvant to straightforward care within the peri-operative interval of older surgical sufferers.  

All of those PhD’s will profit from the experience and expertise of multi-disciplinary supervisory groups comprised of discovery scientists and medical teachers.

Additional data:

Candidates ought to have both:

• a minimal of a 2.1 in a related undergraduate diploma (e.g., Train Science, Physiology, Biology, Biomedical Sciences (non-exhaustive record)), OR
• a minimal of a 2.2 undergraduate diploma and a related Grasp’s diploma.

The best candidate may also have expertise of human physiology and or laboratory analysis and an understanding of getting older physiology.

Casual enquiries could also be addressed to the programme lead, Prof Bethan Phillips ([email protected] ) or to the principal supervisor for every PhD.

To use, candidates ought to ship their CV and a brief cowl letter (<1000 phrases) outlining why they’re making use of to be a part of this PhD programme and what they consider they will supply  to: [email protected] . The e-mail topic line needs to be: “DMT PHD APPLICATION”. Candidates could apply for greater than one of many PhDs listed, however ought to make this identified of their cowl letter. Candidates must also present the contact particulars for two referees, one in every of whom needs to be their most up-to-date tutorial supervisor (or line supervisor in related employment, if relevant). Please be aware, gives of examine shall be topic to 2 passable references being acquired.

Closing Date for Purposes: Monday April twentieth 2024, 10:00am

Provisional Interview Dates: twenty eighth and twenty ninth Could 2024

If you happen to will be unable to attend an interview on the College of Nottingham Medical Faculty at Derby on these dates please make this identified once you electronic mail your utility to Prof Bethan Phillips so various preparations may be thought-about if potential.

PhD Begin Date: 1st October 2024, or as quickly as potential thereafter.