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LifeArc Rare Disease PhD Doctoral Training Programme: Innovative multiomic approaches to improve early detection and diagnosis of rare kidney conditions: a transdisciplinary approach.

School of Medicine, Dentistry and Biomedical Sciences | PHD
Funding
Funded
Reference Number
SMED-2251-1039
Application Deadline
11 April 2025
Start Date
1 October 2025

Overview

This fully funded project is available from October 2025, working as part of our LifeArc Rare Disease PhD Doctoral Training Programme and the UK Kidney Ecosystem. The successful student will benefit from multi-disciplinary and cross-sectoral expertise building a professional network and gaining transdisciplinary training in an area of skills shortage. They will be equipped to work at the academic/industry/3rd sector interface supporting their future career competitiveness and mobility. The student will have access to a UK-wide dynamic, engaged multidisciplinary research network, additionally working with not-for-profit organisations. The student will also have scope to meaningfully contribute to research translation informing rare disease policy and practice. The supervisory team have expertise in molecular epidemiology and public health, rare diseases, artificial intelligence for biomedicine, and paediatric kidney disease. Our rare disease research team is internationally recognised for innovative PPIE. The student will access enthusiastic patient and family members keen to support implementation of innovation in diagnosis and treatment of rare kidney conditions. PPIE and EDI is embedded from conception to delivery, with the student receiving extensive training. The student will gain skills communicating with a wide range of stakeholders, facilitating and co-hosting events, co-developing and disseminating information and supporting STEM activities.

Internationally, the rates of kidney failure are rapidly rising with >68,000 people living a life with kidney failure in the UK. Health economic modelling predicts kidney failure will be the next public health emergency, overwhelming the healthcare system in the next 10 years without radical change.

Almost all kidney failure in children is caused by rare kidney diseases – but a disconnected translational research pathway means new treatments don’t often reach those who need it. Globally, there are more than 300 million people living with rare diseases. This studentship involves working with two prestigious LifeArc translational research centres.
(i) Our LifeArc Centre for the Acceleration of Rare Disease Trials brings together a consortium of Newcastle University, Queen’s University Belfast, and the University of Birmingham, who are pooling their expertise in a £12M Centre to develop a UK ‘4 nations’ approach to deliver trials of new treatments using ‘one stop’, patient friendly models that gets more medicines to people who need them faster.
(ii) The LifeArc-Kidney Research UK Centre for Rare Kidney Diseases will bring transformational change to rare kidney disease research.

Queen’s University Belfast create new groundbreaking £12M research centre, (1) and Rare Disease Focus: supporting rare disease throughout all communities, (2); Acceleration of Rare Disease Trials, (3); LifeArc Translational Centres for Rare Diseases - LifeArc (4)

The supervisory team have a strong track record of kidney disease, rare disease, molecular data science and analysing complex biomedical data to improve patient outcomes, together supporting >35 PhD students to completion. Using artificial intelligence tools to make best use of the sheer amount of data available for multiomic analysis is the driving force behind this cross-faculty collaboration.

Roles within this studentship includes accessing and cleaning data from existing and novel resources such as Genomics England and Our Future Health for >6 million individuals across the UK. Comprehensive biochemical and molecular (genetic, epigenetic, transcriptomic) biomarker data will be linked to hospital episode statistics, mental health services data, imaging data, rare disease registry data, rare kidney registry data, COVID-19 data, mortality data, and electronic healthcare records. The student will help characterise rare kidney conditions, applying multi-modal analytics to help detect and diagnose rare kidney conditions, exploring the potential clinical use for early detection, improved classification, and diagnostic testing.

This project represents a significant opportunity for a motivated student to build extensive networks and gain new skills working with a multidisciplinary team researching data-driven discoveries that support diagnosis and treatment of rare kidney diseases. Diverse stakeholder engagement will include working with commercial colleagues, local and international charities. This project also involves directly working with the Northern Ireland Kidney Research Fund (NIKRF), (5) as the leading charity funding kidney research in Northern Ireland. NIKRF are a volunteer-led organisation who have contributed local funding for kidney research for >50 years, supporting >100 doctors, nurses, and scientists.

1: qub.ac.uk/News/Allnews/featured-research/queens-university-new-groundbreaking-research-centre.html
2: qub.ac.uk/sites/RareDisease/News/230424LifeArcfundingannouncement.html
3: rarediseasetrials.org.uk/
4: lifearc.org/project/lifearc-translational-centres-for-rare-diseases/
5: https://nikidneyresearch.org/

Supervisors:

(Primary) Prof AJ McKnight, Professor of Molecular Epidemiology and Public Health, Centre for Public Health & Director of Postgraduate Research.

(Co-supervisor) Prof Iain Styles, Professor of Computer Science, School of Electronics, Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, specialising in artificial intelligence for biomedicine.

(external) Dr Louise Oni, Consultant Paediatric Nephrologist, Alder Hey Children’s NHS Foundation Trust Hospital and Senior Lecturer in Paediatric Nephrology, University of Liverpool; lead for the UK Kidney Research Ecosystem initiative on behalf of the UK kidney clinical and academic research community.

Proposed interview date: Wednesday 16th April 2025

Funding Information

This fully funded project is available from October 2025, working as part of our LifeArc Rare Disease PhD Doctoral Training Programme and the UK Kidney Ecosystem.

For eligible students the value of an award includes the cost of approved tuition fees and maintenance support aligned to DfE rates, (DfE Postgraduate Studentship Terms and Conditions at View Website). The 2025/26 rates are still to be confirmed.

Project Summary
Supervisor

Professor Amy-Jayne McKnight


Mode of Study

Full-time: 4 Years


Funding Body
Collaborative Studentship
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