The Faculty of Medicine and Dentistry work across traditional boundaries and focus on translational Cancer, Clinical Neuroscience and Infection, Immunity & Inflammation. A recent investment of GBP 25M into the Institute of Translational and Stratified Medicine (ITSMED) strengthens existing centres of excellence for research. Accommodated in the University's prestigious new GBP 17M Derriford Research Facility, ITSMED brings together world-class research strengths in both basic laboratory and translational medicine, providing a dynamic, collaborative and interdisciplinary research environment. Brain Tumour Research Centre at the Faculty is one of four Brain Tumour Research Centres of Excellence in UK, supported by the charity Brain Tumour Research. The results of "Research Excellence Framework (REF) 2014" showed that our School of Medicine ranked in the top 13th overall and the first for highest quality research outputs per head among UK medical schools.
The research programme of Prof Li focuses on Tumour Microenvironment and Translational Cancer Medicine. By employing a variety of approaches including molecular biology, cell biology, immunology, proteomics, next-generation sequencing, bioinformatics, animal models, human tumour samples and relevant clinical data, our research is dedicated to delineate mechanisms on how key molecules (such as microRNAs, lncRNAs, and protein ligands/receptors), signalling pathways (such as Notch signalling), tumour cells, and tumour stromal cells (such as endothelial cells, infiltrating lymphocytes, and tumour-associated macrophages) in tumour microenvironment regulate tumour growth and metastasis as well as tumour response to therapeutic interventions. Our aims are (1) to dissect mechanisms of tumour invasion and metastasis, (2) to develop novel therapeutic targets or predictive biomarkers, and (3) to improve therapeutic efficacy by optimal combinations of chemotherapy, radiotherapy, targeted therapy and immunotherapy.
We are looking for highly motivated individuals with a PhD or MD/PhD and a strong background and passion on cancer biology (or tumour immunology), substantial experience with therapeutic applications, molecular biology techniques, real-time qPCR, cell culture, animal work, and confocal microscopy are essential for the position. Hand on experience with angiogenesis or metastasis assays, bioinformatics analyses, primary tissue samples (xenograft and clinical tumour sampling), immunochemistry or cellular immunology (such as multi-colour FACS analysis, sorting of tumour infiltrating immune cell subsets or functional assays of cytotoxic T cells), and supervision experience for junior staff is of huge advantage. Excellent written and verbal communication, team-working, inter-personal skills and organisation with a strong track record of publications in high-impacted journals and great career ambition are of prerequisite for the position. Although there is no contractual teaching duty but supervision of junior staff and students under the directorship of Prof Li will be highly expected.
Informal enquiries should go to Prof Ji-Liang Li (+44 1752 437491; ji-liang.li@plymouth.ac.uk).
Recruitment and selection will be based on individual merit; however, we should particularly like to encourage applications from women, black and minority ethnic people who are under-represented in this area within Plymouth University.
This is a full-time post working 37 hours per week on a fixed-term basis for either at Grade 7 (for 26 months) or Grade 8 (for 22 months) in the first instance with a high possibility of extension dependent on funding and is available immediately.
University of Plymouth is committed to an inclusive culture and respecting diversity, and welcomes applications from all sections of the community and is a Stonewall diversity champion.
The Faculty of Medicine and Dentistry holds a Silver Athena Swan Award and the University holds a Bronze Athena SWAN Award which recognises commitment to advancing women's careers in STEMM academia.
University of Plymouth has been recognised by Bloomberg as one of the 50 best UK employers for 2016
Research Fellow Job Description
Senior Research Fellow Job Description
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