Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Adipose Tissue - Cardiac Crosstalk in Cardiovascular Disease

Contract: Fixed-term (Available for 36 months to complete a specific task or time limited work, including the need for specific expertise or additional resource for a project.)

Are you a postdoctoral researcher with a keen interest in cardiometabolic molecular physiology and metabolism in health and disease?  Are you interested in how adipose tissue communicates with the heart to regulate cardiac physiology?  Do you want to learn more about adipose tissue-derived bioactive metabokines and their therapeutic potential in heart failure?

The University of Leeds is one of the top 80 universities in the world.  We have a truly global community, with more than 39,000 students from 170 different countries and over 9,000 staff of 100 different nationalities. Established in 1904, we have a strong tradition of academic excellence, reflected in first-class student education, along with world-leading research that has a real impact around the globe.

This postdoctoral fellowship role is on a British Heart Foundation funded project within the laboratory of Prof Lee Roberts, Leeds Institute of Cardiovascular and Metabolic Medicine. The research within Prof Roberts’ group addresses tissue cross talk and bioactive metabolites and lipids (metabokines and lipokines) (PMID: 33772024; PMID: 35365625; PMID: 24411942; PMID: 36137304) in cardiometabolic disease. Prof Roberts’ group aims to use this approach to find novel therapeutics and therapeutic targets for metabolic and cardiovascular diseases including obesity, diabetes and heart failure.

Thermogenic brown and beige adipose tissue are therapeutic targets for cardiometabolic diseases. Beige and brown adipose tissue influence systemic metabolism, including cardiac function, through endocrine signals in the adipocyte secretome. We have identified interorgan metabokine signals released from beige and brown adipose tissue PMID: 33772024. The postdoctoral fellow will characterise the effect of the metabokines on the heart using preclinical animal surgical models of cardiovascular disease and human cardiomyocytes and human patient tissue biopsies. The postdoctoral fellow will generate surgical murine models of cardiovascular disease, characterise cardiac function using imaging techniques such as echocardiography, Magnetic Resonance Imaging and PET/CT. The fellow will also investigate the signalling mechanisms of the metabokines in the heart. The successful candidate will use a variety of additional state-of-the-art techniques including high-resolution respirometry, whole body metabolic phenotyping of animal models including indirect calorimetry, mass spectrometry metabolomics alongside immunohistological, microscopy, tissue culture and molecular biology techniques (gene / protein expression).

We are open to discussing flexible working arrangements.

Please note that this post may be suitable for sponsorship under the Skilled Worker visa route but first-time applicants might need to qualify for salary concessions. For more information please visit: www.gov.uk/skilled-worker-visa.

For research and academic posts, we will consider eligibility under the Global Talent visa. For more information please visit: www.gov.uk/global-talent

What we offer in return

• 26 days holiday plus approx. 16 Bank Holidays/days that the University is closed by custom (including Christmas) – That’s 42 days a year!
• Generous pension scheme plus life assurance– the University contributes 14.5% of salary
• Health and Wellbeing: Discounted staff membership options at The Edge, our state-of-the-art Campus gym, with a pool, sauna, climbing wall, cycle circuit, and sports halls.
• Personal Development: Access to courses run by our Organisational Development & Professional Learning team, and self-development courses including languages, Creative Writing, Wellbeing Therapies and much more.
• Access to on-site childcare, shopping discounts and travel schemes are also available.

And much more!

To explore the post further or for any queries you may have, please contact:

Professor Lee Roberts, Professor of Molecular Phys & Metabolism

Email: L.D.ROBERTS@LEEDS.AC.UK

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