PhD in Antibody Drug Conjugates (Adcs)

In 2024, QUB established a new industry facing institute called the Future Medicines Institute. This is a £55M programme funded by Department of Economy NI and Industry partners, managed by the UKRI Strength in Places programme. This programme is a collaboration between regional Life and Health Sciences commercial and academic partners including Almac Discovery, Randox Laboratories, Almac Diagnostic Services, Diaceutics, Sonrai Analytics, Exploristics, Fusion Antibodies, HIRANI, Ulster University./nAs part of this exciting programme QUB are pleased to announce the establishment of a new doctoral training programme. Initially we are offering up to 10 studentships at QUB. There will also be studentships available in due course at Ulster University./nThe studentships are to help develop collaborative programmes of research between the partners and academic research at QUB. Furthermore, these projects are specifically designed to develop skills and training that are needed by the regional Life and Health Sciences sector. As part of the programme, the cohort of students will also become part of a new doctoral training programme in the Thomas J Moran Graduate School to develop bespoke skills for working with industry./nAntibody drug conjugates (ADCs) are proving effective treatments for solid tumours and haematological malignancies. However, the limited therapeutic index (TI) is still a major challenge for this modality. Consequently, considerable efforts are on-going to develop next generation drug conjugates with enhanced efficacy versus canonical ADCs, with key drivers being improved tumour penetration and increased target-mediated ADC uptake and payload release./nUsing antibody binders to established ADC targets, the aim of this project will be to develop multi-valent ADC protein constructs with different architectures, valencies and affinities and determine target binding, internalisation, trafficking and tumour penetration in cancer cell-line models (including tumour spheroids). This systematic assessment will deliver new insights into ADC design and inform the development of next generation multi/bi-specific ADCs.