Applications for projects starting in September 2024 have now closed.

For fully funded studentships starting in September 2025, projects will be advertised in October 2024.

Below are projects that were recently advertised last year, to give you an idea of projects that could be advertised in the future.

Promoting creative, curiosity-driven frontier bioscience to address fundamental questions in biology.

*CASE: These are CASE DTP studentships. As part of the programme, you will be required to undertake a placement with the CASE partner for a minimum of 3 months.

*AP: These are Standard DTP studentships with an associate partner where you will be required to spend time with each of the partners. You will be asked to apply to one of the partners (as listed in the ‘Host Institution’ column), but this is just for administration purposes.  You will then be registered for your postgraduate studies at one of the partner universities of the lead supervisors.  Your registered university will be confirmed by the DTP following the interview stage of the selection process.

*JD: This project is in collaboration with the University of Bristol and the University of the West of England (UWE) and subject to a joint degree award. Successful applicants will be registered at both these institutions, and graduates will be awarded a joint degree from these two institutions upon successful completion of the PhD programme.

You can find out more about the project supervisor listed below and the research team by visiting our meet our supervisors webpage.

PROJECT TITLE	MAIN / ROTHAMSTED / LEAD SUPERVISOR(S)	HOST INSTITUTION	KEYWORDS
A combined experimental and in silico modelling study of pigment pattern formation in zebrafish	Dr Kit Yates	University of Bath	Mathematical biology, zebrafish pigmentation, pattern formation, experimental biology, mathematical modelling
A synthetic biology magnetic toolkit for detecting bacteria	Prof Jim Spencer	University of Bristol	Biophysics, detection, microbiology, synthetic biology, engineering biology
AAV-Factory: Synthetic viral nanosystem for highly efficient AAV production for gene therapy	Prof Imre Berger	University of Bristol	Synthetic biology and DNA assembly, viral vector, genome engineering, gene therapy, steroid resistant nephrotic syndrome SRNS
ADDomer: Thermostable synthetic self-assembling multiepitope virus-like particle for next-generation vaccines *CASE	Prof Imre Berger	University of Bristol	Infectious disease, next-generation vaccines, synthetic biology, cryo-electron microscopy, bench-to-bedside
Beyond AlphaFold: Experimental and computational folding of a de novo membrane protein	Dr Paul Curnow	University of Bristol	Biophysics, protein folding and design, in vitro transcription/translation, molecular dynamics
Bioinformatics and machine learning/AI based approaches to understanding the mechanism by which long non-coding RNAs regulate the inflammatory response	Prof Mark Andrew Lindsay	University of Bath	Long non-coding RNA, inflammation, innate immune response, bioinformatics, machine learning
Characterising the role of in vivo cell-to-cell communication in the stress system	Prof Soojin Ryu	University of Exeter (Streatham)	Neuroscience, mathematical modelling, stress, zebrafish, cell network
Combining artificial intelligence based drug discovery and automated patch clamping to revolutionise our understanding of lysosomal ion channels	Dr Emyr Lloyd-Evans	Cardiff University	Supercomputing, artificial intelligence, electrophysiology, pharmacology
Coral venom in the era of climate change	Dr Maria Sachkova	University of Bristol	Coral, venom, evolution, protein, molecular clock, climate change
Decoding secret conversations inside cells: Understanding how organelle interactions in human cells are regulated during the cell cycle	Dr Joe Costello	University of Exeter (Streatham)	Molecular cell biology, membrane contact sites, cell cycle, CRISPR TurboID
Design of new fluorescent sensors for measuring heme in cells	Prof Emma Raven	University of Bristol	Synthetic and engineering biology
Designing light harvesting proteins and photoactive enzymes for artificial photosynthesis	Prof Ross Anderson	University of Bristol	Biomolecular design, photosynthesis, electron transfer, synthetic biology, computational protein design
Determining the regulatory control of prokaryotic antiviral defence systems	Prof Tiffany Taylor	University of Bath	Evolution, CRISPR, AMR, bacteria, phage
Developing a multimodal analysis pipeline for the assessment of cardiac dysfunction in aged and diseased adult zebrafish	Dr Beck Richardson	University of Bristol	Cardiovascular disease, zebrafish, cardiac function, techniques development, In vivo imaging
Development of a fungal platform for the expression of high-valuable natural products *AP	Prof Chris Willis / Dr Claudio Greco	University of Bristol (apply here) / Swansea University	Fungal biotechnology, natural products, biosynthesis, metabolomics, synthetic biology
Distilling bacteriophage-host webs: methods to characterise and combine phages for agricultural biocontrol	Dr Remy Chait	University of Exeter (Streatham)	Phage, EPEC, biocontrol, AMR
Divergent sleep behaviour – An evolutionary approach to understand why we sleep	Dr Alice French	University of Bristol	Sleep, drosophila, fertility, physiology, neuroscience
DrESS: A biocatalytic approach for targeted degradation of oncogenic transcription factors	Dr Louis Luk	Cardiff University	Transcription factors, “undruggable” targets, enzyme engineering, high-throughput screening, targeted protein degradation
Dynamic protein design	Dr Jonathan Phillips	University of Exeter (Streatham)	Protein design, molecular dynamics, AI, mathematical modelling, structural proteomics
Enhancing MITF transcription factor activity using protein engineering to investigate melanocyte development and improve melanoma treatment	Dr Keith Vance	University of Bath	Peptide library screening, transcription factor agonists, gene regulation, stem cells, melanoma
Establishing evolutionary timescales	Prof Philip Donoghue	University of Bristol	Molecular clock, evolution, timescale, phylogenetics, metabolism
Evolution of learning and memory circuits	Dr Stephen Montgomery	University of Bristol	Behaviour, evolution, learning, memory, neuroscience
Exploring the combinatorial roles for transcription factors in fate decisions in the neural crest	Prof Robert Kelsh	University of Bath	Stem cells fate, choice transcription factors, developmental biology, genetics
Exploring the Potential of Light-Driven Biocatalysis – Electrifying the engineered redox enzymes for biotransformations	Prof Frank Vollmer	University of Exeter (Streatham)	Opto-enzymology of biotransformations single-molecule electrochemistry optoplasmonic sensors and nano-reactors
Eye-cyt: Improving our understanding of endocytosis within complex in vitro cell models of the eye	Dr Peter Watson	Cardiff University	Cell biology, 3d cell models, microscopy, drug delivery, endocytosis
Harnessing the power of synthetic biology to engineer novel lytic bacteriophages	Dr Tobias Bergmiller	University of Exeter (Streatham)	Bacteriophage, synthetic biology, bacterial genetics, CRISPR, bioinformatics
How do GluD1 glutamate receptors in the hippocampal CA2 region control social behaviours and related mental health conditions?	Prof Zafar Bashir	University of Bristol	Schizophrenia, autism, social behaviours, hippocampus, CA2 region
Imaging analysis of muscle progenitor and stem cell activation in differentiation and repair	Dr Michael Taylor	Cardiff University	Muscle progenitor and stem cells, imaging, CRISPR, tissue repair, cell differentiation
Investigating the impact of neuroactive drug exposure on the developmental and functional neurobiology of the vertebrate brain	Dr Matthew Winter	University of Exeter (Streatham)	Zebrafish, pharmacology, toxicology, in vivo, neuroscience
Investigating the role of neuronal metabolism in excitation/inhibition balance *AP *JD	Dr Kevin Wilkinson / Dr Tim Craig	University of Bristol (apply here) / University of the West of England; UWE	Neurons, synapse, metabolism, endosomal sorting, neuroscience
Mass spectrometry imaging of enzyme activity in brain and beyond *AP	Dr Josie Parker / Prof William Griffiths	Cardiff University (apply here) / Swansea University	Mass spectrometry imaging, enzymology, brain, cytochrome P450s, cholesterol
Modelling the effect of ageing in silico and on Drosophila and mouse clock neurons	Prof James Hodge	University of Bristol	Drosophila, electrophysiology, computational modelling, circadian rhythms, ageing
Precision imaging of hypoxia-induced cellular mRNAs with an advanced cellular penetrating and near infrared emitting molecular probes toolkit	Prof Sofia Pascu	University of Bath	Near-infrared quantitative fluorescence imaging, hypoxia-specific chemical probes, cellular penetrating biosensors, synthetic chemistry of peptide nucleic acids, hypoxia specific mRNA quantification.
Spindle orientation in the developing fly embryo: a joint mathematical-experimental approach	Dr David Richards	University of Exeter (Streatham)	Drosophila development, spindle orientation, mathematical modelling, computer simulation, image analysis
Studying early human embryo development using stem cell models	Dr Ge Guo	University of Exeter (Streatham)	Human embryogenesis, stem cell models, cell lineage segregation, bio-mimetic culture, high-resolution imaging,
Targeting subcellular proteins and processes with designed peptides	Prof Dek Woolfson	University of Bristol	Biodesign, cell biology, coiled coils, protein-protein interactions, engineering biology
The arthropod megaphylogeny and the origin of Earth’s biodiversity	Prof Davide Pisani	University of Bristol	Phylogenomics, arthropoda, molecular clocks, adaptive radiations.
The cellular and molecular responses of diatoms to warming temperatures *AP	Dr Vinod Kumar / Dr Glen Wheeler	University of Exeter (Streatham) (apply here) / Marine Biological Association	Algae, photosynthesis, temperature, oxidative stress, marine biology
The curious case of Turritopsis dohrni jellyfish – elucidating epigenetic principles of immortality	Dr Tomasz Jurkowski	Cardiff University	Biological immortality. epigenetics. aging. omics. rejuvenation
The evolutionary and mechanistic basis of virus host range	Dr Ben Longdon	University of Exeter (Penryn)	Phage, virus, bacteria, host-range, host-shifts
The molecular basis of host manipulation by a parasitic worm	Dr Vicky Hunt	University of Bath	Parasite, host behaviour, entomology, nematomorph
The structural-functional basis for long-lived DNA diffusion by a helicase-nuclease	Prof Mark Szczelkun	University of Bristol	Prokaryotic defence systems, restriction-modification, single molecule enzymology, Cryo-EM
Tissue specific gene expression in Drosophila ‐ dissecting promoter architecture	Prof Helen White-Cooper	Cardiff University	Drosophila, genetics. transcription, spermatogenesis
Towards new biologic drugs: In silico design of T-cell receptor affinity and specificity with biomolecular simulation *CASE	Dr Marc van der Kamp	University of Bristol	Synthetic biology, molecular dynamics, biomolecular design, immunotherapy, protein biophysics
Tracing and shaping the evolutionary paths of engineered biology	Dr Thomas Gorochowski	University of Bristol	Evolution, synthetic biology, nanopore sequencing, gene regulation, genome engineering
Will climate change worsen the problem of antibiotic resistance?	Dr Daniel Padfield	University of Exeter (Penryn)	Antibiotic resistance, climate change, plasmids, pathogens, microbiome