DPhil Biomedical and Clinical Sciences (Oxford-GSK)

This programme is funded by GSK and provides fellows with three years of funding which is inclusive of university fees, clinical research salary on the Grade E63 or E64 scale and consumables. It is anticipated that up to three fellows will be appointed for Oct-2025 graduate admission. The therapeutic areas focus of the fellowships will be neurodegeneration, liver fibrosis and respiratory medicine.

Targeted Development of Data Science Capabilities

• Fellows will receive dedicated training in data science via the OBDS programme.
• Specific data science skills will be determined by individual projects, but it is expected that graduating fellows are proficient in a programming language (e.g. R or Python), understand the coding of healthcare records and approaches to access/analyses the data, and can selected the appropriate biostatistical techniques for the analysis of real-world data, multi-omic big data and the design of machine learning approaches. 

Project Parameters

• It is expected that the focus of projects will be the collection, analysis and interpretation of multi-omic data, with the leveraging of existing departmental infrastructure and personnel to support any laboratory work.
• Supervision will include relevant therapeutic and data science expertise, with representation from both Oxford and GSK.
• Projects will focus on a patient-centric approach to understanding disease endotypes and mechanisms of disease, thus enhancing future patient stratification and precision medicine strategies in drug development.

Therapeutic Areas and Scientific Themes

Neurodegeneration

The following diseases are within scope:

• Alzheimer’s disease
• Parkinson’s disease and Dementia with Lewy Bodies
• Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis

Scientific themes:

• Role of the CNS and peripheral immune system in neurodegeneration.
• Using data from human samples, identify potential mechanisms for drug intervention that differ based on disease stage.
• Discovery and validation of biomarkers (from human samples) reflecting various pathophysiologies that can be used to predict patient phenotype and track response to therapy. Work with GSK team to link to prioritized drug targets (typically selected based on genetic evidence linking to disease risk).

Liver Fibrosis

The following diseases are within scope:

• Steatotic liver disease to encompass metabolism associated steatotic liver disease (MASLD), alcohol related liver disease (ALD) and also MetALD.
• Other fibrotic liver diseases driven by hepatocellular injury considered in scope where these are used as a mechanism to cross-translate into steatotic liver disease.
• Emphasis should be placed upon advanced liver disease (F3 or cirrhosis) with inclusion of other phenotypes included as control populations.

Scientific themes:

• Mechanistic similarities and differences between alcohol and metabolically driven steatohepatitis and how these influence differing rates of disease progression.
• Predictors of and underlying mechanistic basis for fibrosis regression within the context of therapeutic intervention in advanced fibrotic liver disease.
• Circulating and/or imaging-based biomarkers indictive of therapeutic efficacy on fibrosis and inflammation.
• Translationally valid preclinical models of advanced fibrosis.

Respiratory Medicine

The following diseases are within scope:

• COPD
• Bronchiectasis
• ILD (comprising IPF, PPF, CTD-ILD)

Scientific themes:

• Predictors of progressive fibrosis in patients with non-IPF ILD
• Understanding the interplay between of inflammation and fibrosis in CTD-ILD and differences between the systemic and pulmonary compartments
• Circulating, VOC or imaging markers that predict disease progression or response to treatment in ILDs
• Predictors of exacerbators and fast disease progression for COPD
• Characterisation of COPD endotypes throughout disease course
• Similarities and differences between mechanistic drivers of COPD and bronchiectasis

Example Projects

The following are high-level indicative examples of potential projects however please note these are subject to approval.  If shortlisted for interview, candidates will be provided with details of supervisors and projects aligned to their interests, within the three therapeutic areas of neurodegeneration, liver fibrosis and respiratory medicine.

Multi-omic analysis of CNS-draining lymph nodes (Supervisors: Paul Klenerman, Adam Al-Diwani, Paul Harrison, Nicholas Provine)

Defining the role of Tau in oxidative stress (Supervisors: John Todd, Katherine Bull)

Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis: biological drivers of a complex disease (Supervisors: Prof Kevin Talbot, Prof Martin Turner, Dr Alexander Thompson)

Type-2 airway inflammation as a driver of progressive respiratory morbidity: A Predict and Prevent Approach in Obstructive Airways Disease (Supervisors: Professor Ian Pavord (NDM), Dr Nayia Petousi (NDM), Dr Helen Ashdown (NDPCHS))