Oxford-BMS Fellowship
This prestigious 3-year Fellowship (formerly Oxford-Celgene Fellowship) aims to stimulate new scientific discovery and translation and to facilitate skills and people transfer between researchers in academia and industry.
Bristol Myers Squibb (BMS) is a global biopharmaceutical company making advancements in oncology, haematology, immunology and cardiovascular disease. BMS are dedicated to helping patients prevail over serious diseases through a diverse and promising pipeline and new scientific platforms.
BMS acquired Celgene in 2019. Prior to 2019, in partnership with the Oxford Medical Sciences Division, Celgene co-developed and provided support for fellowships which will continue as the Oxford-BMS Translational Research Fellowship Programme.
The goals of this scheme are to stimulate new scientific discovery and translation and to facilitate skills and people transfer between researchers in academia and industry.
This programme offers fellows an opportunity to gain exposure to the field of commercial drug discovery and development. Fellows will have an assigned company mentor and where appropriate be encouraged to spend some time based in BMS laboratories.
Funding will be awarded to Oxford Principal Investigators to support 3 year fellowship projects for early career researchers that demonstrate a clear translational value to the advancement of therapeutics. Three to four awards are made annually.
Currently there are 22 fellows working with BMS and you can read about their projects here.
Principle Investigators should apply for fellowship funding to support clinical (Grade E64) or basic research scientists (Grade 7/8) committed to translational science and interested in obtaining experience with drug development in an industrial setting.
Fellowship applications may include a named fellow, but this is not mandatory. It is expected that a suitable fellowship candidate will be identified by the Principle Investigator within 6 months of notification of successful project selection.
The proposed fellowship needs to align with BMS’s fields of interest as listed below.
1. Novel targets, biomarkers, cellular therapeutic approaches, or translational models in one of the following areas:
- immuno-oncology;
- neurodegenerative and neuroinflammatory diseases including Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, ALS, FTD and MS;
- fibrosing disorders including IPF, NASH, scleroderma, and Renal Fibrosis;
- rheumatic and dermatologic disorders including RA, SLE, spondyloarthropathies, psoriasis and atopic dermatitis;
- haematologic disorders including AML, Myeloma, DLBCL;
- chronic heart failure (either with preserved or reduced ejection fraction).
2. Methods for evaluating biochemical, cellular, tissue and phenotypic consequences of
modulating epigenetic targets.
3. Methods for immuno-phenotyping of human subjects in oncology and autoimmunity
4. Novel imaging approaches to measuring disease activity in the above areas.
Stage 1 - Pre-application questions and meeting with BMS
Stage 1 has now closed. You can still apply with a full application - please contact Charlotte to discuss this.
The Oxford-BMS Fellowship Programme strongly encourages you to take pre-application steps before submitting your application in IRAMS. The pre-application steps ensure that your proposal is in line with BMS’s areas of research interest and involves some pre-application questions and a meeting with BMS.
Stage 2 - Full application
Full applications should be made through IRAMS. The full application form should be uploaded to the system and page limitations specified in the form need to be respected (see section 6 of the guidance for applicants for more detail). Please be aware that only one single PDF can be uploaded to IRAMS - multiple PDFs will need to be combined. Furthermore, a basic budget breakdown needs to be filled in the online application form.
Prospective Principle Investigator applicants should read this application guidance
17 February, 5pm - Deadline for pre-applications to secure a 1:1 meeting with BMS
12 March - 1:1 Meetings with BMS scientists to discuss pre-application project ideas
3 June, 5pm - Deadline for full proposal (submitted through IRAMS)
Early June - Panel review meeting
Late June - Decisions to applicants
Projects with named fellows - expected start dates from 1 October 2020
Projects without named fellows - expected start dates from 1 January 2021
For all enquiries please contact Charlotte Bell, Industry Partnerships Manager, Medical Sciences Industry Partnerships Office
Email: charlotte.bell@medsci.ox.ac.uk
If you would like to book a 1:1 to discuss you potential application with BMS on Thursday 12 March, please complete the pre-application questions and email to charlotte.bell@medsci.ox.ac.uk before 5pm on Monday 17 February.
JOINT STEERING COMMITTEE
Professor Sir Marc Feldmann (Oxford)
Professor Fiona Powrie (Oxford)
Professor Irene Tracey (Oxford)
Professor Chas Bountra (Oxford)
Dr. Maxine Allen (Oxford)
Dr. Rupert Vessey (BMS)
Dr. Leon Carayannopoulos (BMS)
Dr. James Carmichael (BMS)
Dr. Anjan Thakurta (BMS)
Current Fellows
|
|
|
|
'Inhibition of alpha-synuclein aggregation and glial activation as a therapeutic strategy for Parkinson’s disease' |
'A computational framework for T cell trafficking and dynamics in anti-tumour immune responses' |
'Studying the effects of citrullination on the dynamics of receptor-ligand pair interactions at the Immune Synapse' |
|
PI: Richard Wade-Martins |
PI: Mark Coles, Eamonn Gaffney |
|
|
|
|
|
'Investigation of epigenetic and post-translational modifications in altered STAT3' |
'Protein kinase C-θ and PD-1 as a therapeutic target in inflammatory arthritis' |
'Combination therapy of low dose regulatory T cells and low dose IL-2 to prevent rejection in transplantation' |
|
PI: Professor Holm Uhlig & Dr. Arian Laurence |
PI: Graham Ogg, Peter Taylor, Mike Dustin |
PI: Dr Joanna Hester & Dr Fadi Issa |
|
|
|
|
'Ultra low-dose IL-2 therapy in autoimmune diabetes' |
'Use of unbiased T-cell receptor repertoire sequencing to identify novel T-cell subsets involved in coeliac disease and increase the accuracy of the diagnosis of gluten sensitivity' |
'Investigation of T cell reactivity to alpha-synuclein in Parkinson's disease' |
|
PI: John Todd, Claudia Monaco |
PI: Elizabeth Soilleux, Paul Klennerman |
|
|
|
|
|
'Determining changes in clonal/sub clonal architecture and relation to immune marrow environment enabling tumour persistence/relapse in myeloma' |
'Defining an early signature of neutrophil extracellular trap formative predictive of responses to PAD4/2 inhibitors in rheumatic patients' |
'Checkpoint blockade-mediated autoimmune colitis as a model for gut immune homeostasis' |
| PI: Paresh Vyas, Udo Oppermann, Karthik Ramasamy | PI: Irina Udalova, Raashid Luqman | PI: Paul Klenerman, Oliver Brain |
Past Fellows
|
|
|
|
'Definition of new drug targets for fibrosis in Crohns' |
'Single cell analysis of the fibrotic landscape in Dupuytren's Disease' |
'Unravelling the role of E2F-1 citrullination in inflammatory disease' |
|
PI: Alison Simmons |
PI: Jagdeep Nanchahal |
PI: Nick La Thangue |
|
|
|
|
|
||
|
'Clonal and Functional heterogeneity in AG221-treated IDH2 mutant Acute Myeloid Leukaemia' |
|
|
|
PI: Paresh Vyas |
|
|