Midlands Integrative Biosciences Training Partnership

The Department of Biomedical Sciences (School of Infection, Inflammation and Immunology), within the College of Medicine and Health, is offering the following MIBTP projects, as part of 630G PhD in Biomedical Sciences MIBTP programme.

Follow the link on your chosen project title to apply, and on the primary supervisor's name to view their profile and full project outline.

• Valorising berry pomace anthocyanins through sustainable extraction and yoghurt-based bioactivity testing – Dr Bunmi Ibrahim

• Understanding the cellular diversity of the choroid plexus in the brain – Dr Hannah Botfield

• When Oxygen Wakes the Phageome: Phage-Bacteria Interactions in the Human Gut – Dr Richard Horniblow

The School of Biosciences, within the College of Life and Environmental Sciences, is offering the following MIBTP projects, as part of the 167D PhD in School of Biosciences MIBTP programme.

Follow the link on your chosen project title to apply, and on the primary supervisor's name to view their profile and full project outline.

• Structural Function Studies of Bacterial Surface Machinery – Professor Andrew Lovering

• Identifying the evolutionary origin of ‘female’ meiosis in seed plants – Dr Andrew Plackett

• Identifying gene functional changes important to the origin of seeds – Dr Andrew Plackett

• Regulation of cell envelope biogenesis in pathogenic mycobacteria – Dr Apoorva Bhatt

• A multi-omics approach to characterise brain specific biological ageing – Dr Archana Oates

• The competitive brain: how rivals rewire decision making – Professor Carolina Rezaval

• FACS-seq: leveraging a next generation genetic screen to understand gene regulation at the genomic level – Dr Damon Huber

• Keeping pace with protein production: how do cells dynamically scale protein quality control? – Professor Daniel Gibbs

• How does dynamic chromatin regulation shape plant responses to nutrient availability? – Professor Daniel Gibbs

• Nuclear ribosomes and mRNA quality control in eukaryotic gene expression – Dr Saverio Brogna

• RNA stress and neurodegeneration: how UPF1 protects cells from harmful RNA accumulation – Dr Saverio Brogna

• Probing how mito-nuclear interactions impact the pathogenicity of mitochondrial DNA mutations – Professor Hansong Ma

• How does aneuploidy shape host-fungal interactions during the evolution of antifungal resistance? – Dr Hung-Ji Tsai

• Using individual-based modelling to make sense of the weird and wonderful spatial organization of Vibrio cholerae biofilms – Dr Jan-Ulrich Kreft

• Building an AI Virtual Cell from Multi-Scale Multi-Omics Data for Mechanistic Toxicology of Chemical Mixtures – Dr Jiarui Zhou

• Understanding plant development and evolution in the context of environmental responses. – Dr Juliet Coates

• Investigating genetic markers and mechanisms of CO dehydrogenase regulation in response to atmospheric mercury – Dr Marcela Hernandez García

• Development of novel nanomaterials for encapsulation and delivery of small molecules into cells – Dr Nikolas Hodges

• Characterising the Gene Regulatory Network Controlling Grain Colour in Wheat. – Dr Oluwaseyi Shorinola

• How RNA Helicases Work: Mapping Regulatory Sites on DHX29 – Dr Pravin Jagtap

• Nucleotide warfare between phages and bacteria, molecular mechanisms linking anti-phage defence to antibiotic tolerance. – Dr Raphael Teixeira

• Dissecting the functional mechanism of RNA acetylation in health and disease by structural and chemical biology – Professor Teresa Carlomagno

• How Cell Death Fuels Growth – Dr Yun Fan

• Innovative Spheroid Models and gold nano complexes for targeted nanoparticle therapy for head and neck cancer – Dr Nikolas Hodges

• Designing synthetic proteins for sustainable control of fungal plant diseases – Dr Graeme Kettles

• The hidden immune system of fungi: uncovering the roles of NLR genes – Dr Graeme Kettles

• Exploiting silenced genes to improve wheat breeding – Dr Marco Catoni

• Understanding multiple antibiotic resistance mechanisms in pathogenic bacteria – Professor David Grainger

• Understanding the pandemic microbe Vibrio cholerae – Professor David Grainger

• Understanding the rules of life: mechanisms of gene regulation in bacteria – Professor Steve Busby

• Building the Bacterial Barrier: Molecular Mechanisms of Outer Membrane Biogenesis in Gram-Negative Bacteria – Professor Andrew Lovering

The Department of Cancer and Genomic Sciences (School of Medical Sciences), within the College of Medicine and Health, is offering the following MIBTP projects, as part of the 166D PhD in Institute of Cancer and Genomic Sciences MIBTP programme.

Follow the link on your chosen project title to apply, and on the primary supervisor's name to view their profile and full project outline.

• Modelling bile-acid–microbiome regulation of normal intestinal physiology using trustworthy synthetic omics data – Dr Animesh Acharjee

• SleeplessAI: Discovering Latent Sleep Signatures for Equitable Cardiometabolic Risk Prediction using AI on EHR and Molecular Data – Dr Mamunur Rashid

• Mechanisms coordinating transcription and DNA replication throughout S phase – Dr Marco Saponaro

• Investigating the interplay between lysine methylation, metabolism, mitochondria and DNA repair in neurons – Dr Martin Higgs

• Decoding Nucleosomal Asymmetry: Histone post-translational modifications and Structural Implications for Reader Complex Engagement – Dr Paul Badenhorst

• Understanding the role of RAD52 in the Alternative Lengthening of Telomeres mechanism – Dr Ronan Broderick

• A mechanosensitive gene regulatory switch controlling blood stem cell identity – Dr Rui Monteiro

• How Hematopoietic Transcription Factors and Epigenetic Coregulators Shape Gene Regulatory Networks in Immune Cell Development – Dr Tianyi Zhang

• How to regulate the function of cellular "Swiss army knife": the p97 unfoldase. – Professor Aga Gambus

• Hidden Guardians: How Chromatin Structure Shapes the Body’s First Line of Defence – Professor Jo Morris

• RNA fate, cell fate: Why stem cells differ in their dependency on m6A – Dr Tianyi Zhang

The Department of Cardiovascular Sciences (School of Medical Sciences), within the College of Medicine and Health, is offering the following MIBTP projects, as part of the 975E PhD in Cardiovascular Sciences (MIBTP) programme.

Follow the link on your chosen project title to apply, and on the primary supervisor's name to view their profile and full project outline.

Please note: the application links for this programme are not yet available.

• Decoding IL-17-mediated immune-cardiac signalling and electrical remodelling during cardiorenal stress – Prof Davor Pavlovic

• Mapping immune organotropism: how inflammation in one organ targets another – Dr Juma El-Awaisi

The School of Chemical Engineering, within the College of Engineering and Physical Sciences, is offering the following MIBTP projects, as part of the 168D PhD in Chemical Engineering (MIBTP) programme.

Follow the link on your chosen project title to apply, and on the primary supervisor's name to view their profile and full project outline.

• BEACON: Biofilm Engineering through Advanced Capsule-based Observation and aNalysis – Dr David Bassett

• Algae as superfoods: safe, protein-rich microalgal flour for the baking industry – Professor Helen Onyeaka

• Bio-chemo-cat: Hybrid renewable production of acrylic acid and propylene glycol from potato waste towards a circular bioeconomy – Professor Joseph Wood

• Dynamic extracellular matrix mimetics for transformative mechanobiological and metabolic discovery across soft tissues – Dr Patricia Esteban

• Smart Materials: Harnessing Sound to Combat Bacterial Growth – Professor Paula Mendes

• Thermal or non-thermal? How ohmic heating inactivates foodborne pathogens and spores – Dr Taghi Miri

• Can we eliminate biofilms by feeding bacteria differently? – Professor Tim Overton

• How can we direct recombinant proteins into the periplasm efficiently? – Professor Tim Overton

The School of Chemistry, within the College of Engineering and Physical Sciences, is offering the following MIBTP projects, as part of the 165D PhD in Chemistry (MIBTP) programme.

Follow the link on your chosen project title to apply, and on the primary supervisor's name to view their profile and full project outline.

• Engineering surface-integrated EXPAR for electrochemical nucleic-acid sensing – Professor James Tucker

• From Biomass to Battery Graphite: Developing Sustainable Carbon Materials for Energy Storage – Dr Zoe Schnepp

• Understanding Intrinsically Disordered Protein-Protein Interactions Using Peptidomimetics – Professor Andy Wilson

• Biogenic volatile organic compounds as a non-invasive route to monitoring plant stress – Dr Julia Lehman

• New bioinorganic tools to explore the roles of DNA junction structures in biology – Professor Michael Hannon

• Changing the Dynamics and Structures of key viral RNA structures using nano-size supramolecular drugs – Professor Michael Hannon

• MOF-RNA Encapsulation and Delivery – Professor Neil Champness

• DNA-MOF composites: Bespoke Biocompatible Materials – Professor Neil Champness

• What makes a good antimicrobial agent? – Dr Sarah Horswell

• Biomimetic Foldamers as a New Class of Sustainable Catalysts. – Dr Sarah Pike

• Metallo Foldamer-Proteins Hybrids: Novel Biomimetic Scaffolds for Sensing and Imaging Applications – Dr Sarah Pike

• Photoactivated metallo-agents on ultrasmall gold nanoclusters for cellular targeting: towards new therapies – Professor Zoe Pikramenou

• Nanoparticles decorated with metal complexes for targeted antibiotic delivery and imaging in bacteria and biofilms – Professor Zoe Pikramenou

• Engineering Biological Interfaces: Building and Exploiting Planar Membrane and Protein Assemblies – Dr Dominik Kubicki

The School of Computer Science, within the College of Engineering and Physical Sciences, is offering the following MIBTP project, as part of the 486J PhD Computer Science FT (MIBTP) programme.

Follow the link on your chosen project title to apply, and on the primary supervisor's name to view their profile and full project outline.

Please note: the application links for this programme are not yet available.

• Generative AI for Recovering 4D Digital Hearts from Routine 2D Cardiac Imaging – Dr Qingjie Meng

• Multimodal Learning and Vision-Language Models for Understanding Human Organ Proportions – Dr Qingjie Meng

The School of Engineering, within the College of Engineering and Physical Sciences, is offering the following MIBTP project, as part of the PhD in Electrical Engineering (MIBTP) programme.

Follow the link on your chosen project title to apply, and on the primary supervisor's name to view their profile and full project outline.

Please note: the application links for this programme are not yet available. 

• Learning the kinetic rules of DNA amplification through high-throughput EXPAR and machine learning – Dr Robert Simpson

• Kinetic co-design of DNA amplification and ultrasensitive photonic sensing – Dr Robert Simpson

The School of Engineering, within the College of Engineering and Physical Sciences, is offering the following MIBTP project, as part of the 488J PhD in Engineering (MIBTP) programme.

Follow the link on your chosen project title to apply, and on the primary supervisor's name to view their profile and full project outline.

Please note: the application links for this programme are not yet available.

• Water and the biology of structure of articular cartilage – Dr Daniel Espino

• What's Going On? AI-Driven behavioural phenomics and multiomics revealing evolutionary responses to mixtures in resurrected Daphnia magna – Dr Iestyn Stead

• Cities, soil and sustainability: Integrating soil microbiomes, AI and life cycle assessment for climate-resilient urban green infrastructure – Dr Neha Mehta

• Understanding and preventing shock-induced tissue injury using dynamic nanofluidics – Dr Yueting Sun

The School of Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences, within the College of Life and Environmental Sciences, is offering the following MIBTP projects, as part of the 604G PhD in Geography and Environmental Science MIBTP programme.

Follow the link on your chosen project title to apply, and on the primary supervisor's name to view their profile and full project outline.

• Agriculture wildfire; assessing and mitigating the risk to sustainable UK arable farming – Professor Nicholas Kettridge

• Sense-treat-erase Metal organic Frameworks for autonomous crop protection – Dr Swaroop Chakraborty

The Department of Immunology and Immunotherapy (School of Infection, Inflammation and Immunology), within the College of Medicine and Health, is offering the following MIBTP projects, as part of the 192D PhD in Institute of Immunology and Immunotherapy MIBTP programme.

Follow the link on your chosen project title to apply, and on the primary supervisor's name to view their profile and full project outline.

• Molecular rules of fibroblast growth factor receptor movement, assembly and signalling – Dr Daniel Nieves

• Learning the rules of cellular architecture – Professor Dylan Owen

The Department of Inflammation and Ageing (School of Infection, Inflammation and Immunology), within the College of Medicine and Health, is offering the following MIBTP projects, as part of the 608G PhD in Institute of Inflammation and Ageing MIBTP programme.

Follow the link on your chosen project title to apply, and on the primary supervisor's name to view their profile and full project outline.

• Investigating the dual impact of lactate on the pathogen and the host during Mycobacterium tuberculosis infection – Dr Alba Llibre

• Developing and applying computational methods to study ageing and cellular rejuvenation – Professor Joao Pedro Magalhaes

• Developing mitochondrial-targeted therapies for stem-cell rejuvenation – Dr Jose Hombrebueno

The School of Mathematics, within the College of Engineering and Physical Sciences, is offering the following MIBTP project, as part of the 494J PhD Mathematics FT (MIBTP) programme.

Follow the link on your chosen project title to apply, and on the primary supervisor's name to view their profile and full project outline.

Please note: the application links for this programme are not yet available.

• Decoding Human Thalamocortical Interactions with Invasive Electrophysiology – Dr Enrico Amico

• Mechanistic Modelling of Biofilm-Induced Host-Cell Damage – Dr Maryam Parvizi

• Mathematical modelling of toxic-compound accumulation in E. coli: using computational models to enhance industrial bioprocessing & antibiotic efficacy – Professor Sara Jabbari

The Department of Metabolism Systems Research (School of Medical Sciences), within the College of Medicine and Health, is offering the following MIBTP projects, as part of the 607G PhD in Metabolism and Systems Science programme.

Follow the link on your chosen project title to apply, and on the primary supervisor's name to view their profile and full project outline.

• Investigating how accessory proteins modify the function of G protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs) involved in appetite regulation – Dr Caroline Gorvin

• Investigating single-molecule interactions and plasma membrane dynamics between G protein-coupled receptors (GPCR) and accessory proteins – Dr Caroline Gorvin

• New Technological Platform for Metabolic Analysis in Health and Disease – Dr Christian Ludwig

• One Stress, Two Fates: How Mitochondrial Metabolism Shapes Muscle Ageing – Dr Sofia Ahola

• Decoding a Novel Signalling Hub in Cellular Function – Dr Vicki Smith

The School of Metallurgy and Materials, within the College of Engineering and Physical Sciences, is offering the following MIBTP project, as part of the 958K PhD Metallurgy and Materials MIBTP programme.

Follow the link on your chosen project title to apply, and on the primary supervisor's name to view their profile and full project outline.

• Engineering Piezo-Activated PLLA Biointerfaces to Control Antimicrobial Peptide Binding, ROS Signalling and Host-Microbe Responses – Professor Artemis Stamboulis

• Understanding the microbial fate of fluorines as a route for PFAS mitigation strategies – Dr Jacqueline Edge

The Department of Microbes, Infections and Microbiomes (School of Infection, Inflammation and Immunology), within the College of Medicine and Health, is offering the following MIBTP projects, as part of the 865D PhD in Microbes, Infections and Microbiomes MIBTP programme.

Follow the link on your chosen project title to apply, and on the primary supervisor's name to view their profile and full project outline.

• Understanding the food webs of the vaginal microbiota. – Dr Lucy Crouch

• Changing shapes; investigating the role of the microbiome in the development of gastric intestinal metaplasia. – Dr Amanda Rossiter

• How Does Heterogeneity in Antibiotic Accumulation Shape the Evolution of AMR? – Professor Jessica Blair

• Collateral damage or ecological control? Defining how bacteriophages shape Escherichia dynamics in the early-life gut – Professor Lindsay Hall

• Do ESKAPE pathogens have a sweet tooth? – Dr Lucy Crouch

• How membrane lipids and oxygen shape fungal growth and host invasion – Dr Maria Makarova

• Host-pathogen compatibility in TB: defining how M.tuberculosis lineage and human ancestry shape TB phenotype, transmission and immune control. – Professor Matt O'Shea

• Harnessing trained innate immunity to mitigate hypervirulent multidrug-resistant Klebsiella pneumoniae infection – Professor Matt O'Shea

• Phylosymbiosis of Streptococcus in the great ape oral microbiome – Dr Michael Cox

• Mechanisms of azithromycin action in host-microbiome models of the respiratory tract – Dr Michael Cox

• Antimicrobial Resistant E. coli in the infant microbiome – Dr Michelle Buckner

• The Role of Glycogen Metabolism in Survival, Adaptation and Virulence of Human Gut Microbes – Professor Willem van Schaik

The Department of Pharmacy (School of Health Sciences), within the College of Medicine and Health, is offering the following MIBTP projects, as part of the 610G PhD in Pharmacy MIBTP programme.

Follow the link on your chosen project title to apply, and on the primary supervisor's name to view their profile and full project outline.

• Unravelling the role of CRELD1 in mitochondrial regulation in brain development – Dr Felix Chan

• Decoding the Structure-Activity Relationships and Mechanisms of Foldamer-Induced Cell Death – Dr Isolda Romero Canelon

• Experimental Investigation of Biofilm-Induced Host-Cell Damage – Dr Ekene Anakor

• Lipid-based nanocarriers as a strategy to improve delivery and enhance the efficacy of anti-infective compounds – Dr Sarah Gordon

The School of Psychology, within the College of Life and Environmental Sciences, is offering the following MIBTP projects, as part of the 181D PhD in School of Psychology MIBTP programme.

Follow the link on your chosen project title to apply, and on the primary supervisor's name to view their profile and full project outline.

• Deep Neuroengineering: Developing novel non-invasive deep brain ultrasound stimulation supporting higher cognition in humans – Dr Lei Zhang

• Sensorimotor Coordination between Humans and Artificial Musical Partners – Dr Massimiliano di Luca

• Understanding the human thalamocortical system in sleep and attention – Professor Andrew Bagshaw

• Exploring daily rhythms in brain state and perception – Dr Andrew Quinn

• Using artificial intelligence to reveal the computational principles of neural competition – Dr Clayton Hickey

• Investigating the role of brain-body interactions in conscious awareness via central and peripheral electrophysiology – Dr Damian Cruse

• Using multimodal neuroimaging to predict individual differences in responsiveness to non-invasive brain stimulation – Professor Davinia Fernandez-Espejo

• Role of T-Cells and Toll-Like Receptors in Brain Plasticity, Health and Disease – Dr Jack Rogers

• Optimizing motor memories with unpredictable reward – Professor Joseph Galea

• Sleep, Circadian Rhythm, and Brain Vascular Health in Ageing – Professor Katrien Segaert

• From brain to plate: exercise, hippocampal health, and appetite in older adults – Professor Katrien Segaert

• Cognitive maps for adaptive causal inference – Dr Paul Muhle-Karbe

• Enhancing Neuroimaging Genetics through Meta-analysis (ENIGMA): Antisocial Behaviour working group – Professor Stephane De Brito

• Mapping brain fingerprints of psychopathology across the lifespan – Professor Stephane De Brito

• Neural Mechanisms of Audiovisual Speech Integration in the Developing Infant Brain – Dr Hyojin Park

• The resilient system: Socio-ecological buffers against childhood poverty-related mental health risk – Dr Maria Dauvermann

• Language Experience and Early Brain Network Development for Attention – Professor Andrea Krott

• When senses disagree: how people update predictions for action in virtual reality – Dr Massimiliano Di Luca

• Keeping Up with Conversation: Bilingualism and the Resilient Ageing Brain – Professor Tamara Swaab

• Adapting to Other Minds: Bilingual Experience and Social Communication in the Ageing Brain – Professor Andrea Krott

• Predicting Attention and Action in the Developing Brain with Wearable Neuroimaging and Modelling – Dr Kyungmin An

The School of Sport, Exercise and Rehabilitation Sciences, within the College of Life and Environmental Sciences, is offering the following MIBTP projects, as part of the 180D PhD in School of Sport, Exercise and Rehabilitation Science MIBTP programme.

Follow the link on your chosen project title to apply, and on the primary supervisor's name to view their profile and full project outline.

• Musculoskeletal and physiological responses to short-term vortex wave stimulation in older adults. – Dr Jonathan Quinlan

• Cerebellar Contributions to Respiratory Motor Learning – Dr Joseph Welch

• Exercise-Induced Extracellular Vesicles and Tissue Crosstalk in Health – Dr Martin Whitham

• Neural control of task failure: from neuromuscular mechanisms to predictive models – Dr Nicholas Holmes

• Defining the physiological role of amyloid-β in brain energy metabolism – Dr Richard Elsworthy

• Brain lactate as a mechanism linking exercise to brain health across the lifespan – Dr Richard Elsworthy

• Understanding the vascular health impact of upper-body exercise – Dr Tom Nightingale

• Optimising Exercise Performance and Cardiovascular Health Through Non-Invasive Vagus Nerve Stimulation – Dr Tom Nightingale

• Brain on Wheels: Uncovering the Sensorimotor Control of Cycling – Dr Sang Yeo

We will use the email address you provide here to contact you regarding your application. If you would like us to contact you using another email address, please let us know by contacting uob-mibtp@contacts.bham.ac.uk.  

You will be asked to provide details of your academic history and upload evidence. Please note:

• Our admissions team will assess your grades and documents in context, so do not worry if your grades are not in a common format.

• Digital transcripts/certificates are normally acceptable as long as they are in English.

• The academic transcript needs to include all modules, grades and the overall grade.

English language test certificates can be submitted after the initial application; it will be a condition of your offer if one is made.

There are some circumstances that exempt you from taking an English language test even if English is not your first language. The admissions team will discuss this with you further if an offer is made.

You can view general language requirements: International postgraduate entry requirements - University of Birmingham

Select 'Advertised research area' when prompted.

Project & Supervisor Name: Please state the project title and primary supervisor name on your application exactly as it is written on the University of Birmingham website. We recommend simply copy + pasting the information below into your application form.

Supervisor Contact: We encourage you to contact the supervisor for your chosen project before applying, but this is not mandatory.

Research Methods: You must answer the question regarding Research Methods training when applying for this programme.

Research Proposal: A research proposal is not required for this programme. This is a mandatory field on the application portal – you can safely upload a blank document here instead of providing a research proposal.

CV: You must upload a CV as part of your application.  

A personal statement is optional when applying for this programme. This is a mandatory field on the application portal – just type N/A or the equivalent into the text box if you choose not to provide a personal statement. 

Please select 'Research Council Funding', and 'Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC)' when asked about how you intend to fund your studies.