Fully Funded SUSPRS PhD Scholarship: Mathematical and Computational Approaches to Explore the Reciprocal Interaction Between Cell Metabolism and Radiation Therapy in Cancer

Funding providers: Swansea University Strategic Partnership Research Scholarships (SUSPRS) with Université Grenoble Alpes, France

Subject areas: Applied Mathematics, Mathematical and Computational Biology

Project description: 

This is a joint PhD programme between Swansea University and Université Grenoble Alpes.

Gliomas are brain tumours characterized by the invasion of the surrounding healthy tissues by tumour cells. This cell dissemination in the brain tissue makes this cancer extremely difficult to treat. Although during radiotherapy, tumours are irradiated over an area larger than the tumour centre, there is an almost systematic recurrence of the tumour.

Several hypotheses can explain this phenomenon: the first is that the effectiveness of radiation depends on cellular metabolism; the second is that radiation increases migration, either directly by changing the metabolism of tumour cells and increasing their migratory power, or indirectly by affecting surrounding tissues.

Mathematical modelling proves very efficient and powerful to decipher the relationship between many entangled mechanisms. Many computational models of tumour growth have been developed over the past 20 years to understand the mechanisms involved in tumour evolution, to predict the effect of a variety of therapies and to optimize the therapeutic protocols. Integration of metabolism is relatively recent and up to now, there is no model specifically investigating the metabolism/irradiation interactions, informed, and validated with experimental data, which makes our project particularly original and innovative.

The objective of our project is to better understand the reciprocal relationship between the cell metabolism and the irradiation. To that end we will develop a multi-scale, multi-physics computational model, based on experimental in vitro results recently obtained by our collaborator at the IJCLab. The aim is first to obtain a model able to interpret and explain our experimental results. Then the model will be analysed both mathematically and numerically to identify the key parameters of the metabolism-irradiation interactions. The model will be used to predict the in vitro tumour evolution under treatment. We will then seek to identify the metabolic pathways to be specifically targeted to optimize the therapy and to optimize the radiation parameters including scheduling and dosage.

Eligibility

Candidates must hold a recognised master’s degree in a relevant discipline that include Applied Mathematics, Biophysics, Bioinformatics, Computational Biology, Biomedical Engineering and appropriate English Language qualification. Please note that you may need to provide evidence of your English Language proficiency.

This scholarship is open to candidates of any nationality.

Please visit our website for more information on eligibility.

Additional Funding Information

This scholarship covers the full cost of tuition fees and an annual stipend at £19,237.

Additional research expenses will also be available. 

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