Research Fellow

About us

The mission of the UCL Great Ormond Street Institute of Child Health is to improve the health and well-being of children, and the adults they will become, through world-class research, education and public engagement. The UCL GOS ICH, together with its clinical partner Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children, forms the largest concentration of children’s health research outside North America. GOS ICH’s activities include active engagement with children and families, to ensure that our work is relevant and appropriate to their needs. GOS ICH generates the funding for our research by setting out our proposals in high quality applications to public, charitable and industrial funding bodies and disseminates the results of our research by publication in the medical and scientific literature, to clinicians, policy makers and the wider public. The Institute offers world-class education and training across a wide range of teaching and life learning programmes which address the needs of students and professional groups who are interested in and undertaking work relevant to child health.

About the role

A new post follows the award of a 4 year Stand up to Cancer/CRUK programme grant in the “Paediatric Cancer New Discoveries Challenge” scheme and is part of a $5m award. This new post for 2 years in the first instance but with an expectation of extension represents an opportunity for an experienced post-doctoral research fellow to develop their expertise in the development of CAR-T cell small molecule combination studies. The group has developed new CAR-T products that are regulated by immune modulatory (IMiD) drugs and secured clinical trial funding for delivery of two academic phase I combination trials. This new role will enable the appointee to develop the technology further through addition of regulatory modules and evaluation of optimal combination treatments in immune competent animal models. There will be an opportunity to gain experience in Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP) of the CAR-T products through integration with the team working on the project within the Great Ormond Street Hospital academic GMP facility. The job represents a significant opportunity for a scientist with an interest in immunology and cancer therapeutics to be at the leading edge of clinical trial development in the engineered T cell field in paediatric oncology.

About you

The successful candidate will have a PhD in the biomedical sciences and previous experience of cell and gene therapies as well as a working knowledge and understanding of working within a preclinical therapeutics development team. We particularly welcome applicants who have previous hands on experience of working with immune assays, viral transduction, molecular cloning and animal experiments. Consideration will be given to applicants who lack direct experience of one of these skills but who have demonstrable team leadership and management skills.

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