How well can mice reproduce human frailty?

Details

We are living longer but not necessarily healthier. One condition that affect older people is frailty, which makes people vulnerable to stressors such as infections or falls in a much more profound way than younger people. They may require to be admitted to hospital for minor infections such as flu and stay there for prolonged periods of time and never fully recover, requiring help in their activities of daily leaving.

New research on ageing has identified drugs, which improve frailty and make older people less vulnerable to these stressors. They work well in aged mice but we do not know how well the mice reproduce the molecular deficits occurring in patients with frailty and therefore whether it is likely that these interventions will produce benefits in patients with frailty.

Using metabolomics and proteomics techniques combined with artificial intelligence and bioinformatic approaches for the analysis of large data sets this project aims at

1. Identifying the molecular signatures associated with different degree of frailty in mice

2. Compare those with the signatures already available in patients affected by frailty

3. Determine whether promising interventions able to prevent frailty, show changes in the molecular frailty signatures which indicate prevention or reversal of frailty.

Entry Requirements:

Candidates must have a first or upper second class honours degree. Previous research experience in biochemistry and analysis of "omics" data would be an advantage.

How to apply:

Please complete a University Postgraduate Research Application form available here: https://www.sheffield.ac.uk/postgraduate/phd/apply/applying. 

Please clearly state the prospective main supervisor in the respective box and select ‘School of Medicine & Population Health: Infection, Immunology and Cardiovascular Disease as the department.

Proposed start date - October 2024