PhD Studentship: City University-EPSRC Doctoral Training Partnership Doctoral Scholarship

Applications are invited for one EPSRC-funded Doctoral Training Partnership (DTP) PhD studentship starting 1st Feb 2024 within the School of Science and Technology of City, University of London. Successful applicants will receive an annual stipend (bursary) of £19.668 p.a.  plus payment of their full-time tuition fees for a period of up to 48 months (4 years).

The scholarships are available exclusively to UK nationals.

We are particularly keen to encourage applications from groups which are otherwise underrepresented within our disciplines, especially from women and/or those from minority ethnic backgrounds, and individuals from non-traditional career routes.

The DTP PhD studentship supports research in the following project:

BRAINPULSE: Understanding cerebrospinal fluid transport from flow studies in a transparent model of the human brain and CFD

Recent discoveries on mice model showed the importance of neural-induced flow waves during sleep for the cleansing of toxins from the brain liquid, the cerebrospinal fluid (CSF). This discovery might have large consequences on the understanding of human diseases like Alzheimer and others. It was found that the neural activity during sleep drives a pulsating flow situation that supports transport and exchange of CFS. The project aims to set up a physical and numerical model of the brain and the interior fluid chambers for investigations of this flow exchange. A transparent model of the brain allows to study the flow features within the CSF space using Particle-Image-Velocimetry (PIV) and offers the comparison to Computation Fluid Dynamics Simulations (CFD) for quantifying the shear stresses and to investigate possible transport mechanisms linked to such pulse waves.

Applicants for this scholarship should have an upper second-class BSc/BEng/MEng (or equivalent, or higher) degree and should have experience in optical flow measurements such as PIV and simulation tools for CFD.  Their educational background should be on fluid mechanics and/or Aerodynamics.  Experimental skills and handling of computational design tools are recommended. The work will be in an interdisciplinary environment with communication between engineering, biomedical and physical disciplines.  It is expected that the  applicants demonstrate aptitude for original research. 

For more information, please contact [email protected]  or [email protected]

To apply for this scholarship please click the 'Apply' button, above.