Projects Call - Surgeon Scientist Pre-Doctoral Programme

• Call open: Friday 23 February 2024
• Call closed: Tuesday 2 April 2024
• Completed applications should be sent to BRC@gosh.nhs.uk
• Review and outcome notification: early May

The National Institute for Health and Care Research Great Ormond Street Hospital Biomedical Research Centre (GOSH BRC) is a collaboration between Great Ormond Street Hospital (GOSH) and the UCL Great Ormond Street Institute of Child Health (ICH). It funds early translational research focused on paediatric rare or complex diseases, which aims to translate discoveries from basic/discovery science into clinical research and through to patient and economic benefit. We were first awarded BRC status from the NIHR in 2007 and, in 2022, we secured £35 million for our fourth term until 30th November 2027.

Essential to delivering the BRC’s strategy is also our newly created Paediatric Excellence Initiative, a partnership between the BRC, Alder Hey, Birmingham and Sheffield Children’s Hospitals. The initiative will enable more rapid translation of our research, help to create a network of excellence and reflects our ambition to ensure staff from a range of career stages, professions and backgrounds can influence our strategy.

The Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine (TERM) theme offers an ideal opportunity for collaboration between GOSH and Alder Hey to create a pipeline of research training opportunities for future surgeon scientist leaders. It aims to pioneer the repair and reconstruction of tissues and organs to treat children with structural malformations, tissue and organ failure, and to improve their life expectancy and quality of life. The theme combines expertise in stem cell biology, iPSC platforms, bioengineering, and paediatric surgery to pioneer laboratory-grown organs and develop strategies for tissue and organ restoration.

Together with Alder Hey Children’s Hospital, TERM theme have established a surgeon scientist training programme at pre-doctoral level, joint between Alder Hey and GOSH, to provide opportunities for research training, protected research time to develop a competitive application for a doctoral fellowship, and to ultimately develop future surgeon scientist leaders. The aim is to increase capacity through training in the scientific basis of paediatric surgery, with a focus on treating children who suffer from congenital malformations and other conditions requiring surgery.

We have funding to support a number of short-term (6-12 months full-time equivalent) research placements for surgical trainees (ST1-8 or equivalent) over the period of the current GOSH BRC funding term (Dec 2022-Nov 2027). In the first year, we piloted the scheme by investing in our mutual strategic area of research into Hirschsprung’s disease. This year we hope to fund at least one fellow to undertake a research project supervised jointly by GOSH and Alder Hey surgeon-academic partnerships in other areas of translational research.

Please note that this funding can only support dedicated research time with salary for the up to 12 months’ full-time research. The duration of the fellowship can be 6-12 months as 1.0 FTE for research, or over a period of two years (e.g. 50% research:50% clinical).

This call invites research outline proposals from joint partnerships between Alder Hey and GOSH surgeons and collaborating academics from partner universities (Liverpool and UCL GOS Institute of Child Health) to build a portfolio of projects that will be made available for the applicants applying for the pre-PhD internship.

Projects should be aligned to GOSH BRC TERM and AH strategic objectives. For this call we will prioritise projects in the remit of nephro-urology and associated pathologies.

- Development of engineered next generation human organoid tissue models that model functional tissue properties to investigate pathophysiology of developmental malformations.

- Proof-of-concept tissue engineering studies of replacement tissues for patient treatment.

- Developing GMP-compatible replacement tissues and cells.

- Developing innovative strategies for repair and reconstruction of tissue or birth defects which apply surgical science tools (diagnostics, devices and therapeutics) to improve paediatric health outcomes).

The conditions of NIHR funding of the GOSH BRC do not permit support for animal research studies. Therefore proposals cannot include animal research.

Conditions

• Applications for projects must include joint partnership between Alder Hey and GOSH as a minimum and preferably an additional academic partner from either university (UCL GOS Institute of Child Health or University of Liverpool).
• Primary applicants may submit up to two project outlines for inclusion in the portfolio of options which is offered to potential fellows, but no more than one will be awarded per round.
• Inclusion of your project outline in the portfolio will not guarantee you a fellow; potential fellows will be asked to choose between available options.
• For this round, it is expected that the fellow will be appointed from 1st December 2024 and no later than February 2025.
• Fellows will be employed at Alder Hey hospital and therefore the Principal Investigator for the proposal should be an Alder Hey surgeon who will have direct line-management responsibility.

Selection criteria

• Alignment of the project proposal to the aims of GOSH BRC TERM theme, as outlined in the guidance above.
• Innovative aspects of the proposed project and its scientific excellence.
• Likelihood of generating preliminary data in support of a subsequent application for funding for a PhD studentship
• Likelihood that the project will lead in the future to translational impact. This may include but is not limited to patient benefit via novel interventions/biomarkers, changing clinical guidelines/practice, future external funding, and/or patent filing/commercial activity.
• Track record of the supervisory team for academic supervision.
• Feasibility of the project to be delivered within the proposed timeline.

Applications will close on the 2 April, 2024

Completed application forms and CVs for all supervisors should be submitted by e-mail as a MS Word document to BRC@gosh.nhs.uk by the deadline. Late applications will not be considered.

If any sections of your application form exceed the word limit stated on the form, the BRC secretariat will delete the text that comes after the limit, prior to expert review.

Following submission, a shortlisting panel will select projects to be offered to applicants in an open call for surgeon scientist pre-PhD fellowships. Lead supervisors on the proposal outlines will be notified of the outcome within 4 weeks of the shortlisting.

Selection of applicants is expected to be complete by 1 August 2024 and the successful candidate will be informed within 4 weeks of this date. The successful candidate will be anticipated to have a start date of 1 December 2024 (subject to approval of adequate out-of-programme time).

• Projects must be in the remit of translational research with a mutual GOSH Charity-GOSH BRC focus on treating children who suffer from congenital malformations, cancers and other conditions requiring surgery.
• Primary supervisors may submit up to two project outlines for inclusion in the portfolio but can only take one student per round.
• Supervisory group who already supervise a Lewis Spitz fellow are not eligible to apply for this call.
• PhD candidates will be substantively employed at GOSH or UCL GOS ICH.
• Inclusion of your project outline in the portfolio will not guarantee you a student.

Selection criteria are:

• Alignment of the project proposal to the mutually beneficial aims of GOSH Charity and GOSH BRC, as outlined in the guidance above.
• Innovative aspects of the proposed project and its scientific excellence.
• Likelihood that the project will lead in the future to translational impact. This may include but is not limited to patient benefit via novel interventions/biomarkers, changing clinical guidelines/practice, future external funding, and/or patent filing/commercial activity.
• Track record of the supervisory team for past PhD supervision.
• Feasibility of the project to be delivered within the PhD timeframe.

Completed application forms and CVs for primary academic and clinical supervisors should be submitted by e-mail to BRC@gosh.nhs.uk by the deadline.

Following submission, a shortlisting panel will approve the portfolio of possible projects for inclusion in the open call for surgeon scientist PhD fellowships. All applicants will be notified of the outcome shortly after.

Following projects adoption process, we will advertise PhD fellowships externally to invite applications from surgeons who wish to conduct a PhD under this programme. Shortlisted applicants will be interviewed by the Lewis Spitz Surgeon Scientist PhD programme panel.

Successful candidates will select projects and will be paired up with supervisors on the basis of the outline projects in the portfolio and their specific interests. Top selected students will get priority to their choice of a project. Supervisors will work together with the student on a full PhD project proposal which will be submitted for final approval by a sub-committee of the interview panel.

Applications to the pre-doctoral programme will be open shortly after the projects portfolio has been assembled.

Funding will support successful candidates’ base salary appropriate to the surgeon scientist’s level of clinical training (ST1-ST8 or equivalent), up to but not including NHS consultant (or equivalent) level for research activity (clinical work not included). We would welcome proposals that may offer matched funding to support concurrent clinical career development for the fellow.

Please note that the BRC funding will only support salary for research time. If funding for part-time research - such as the 50% research/50% clinical split above - is requested, the supervisory groups would need to ensure that the salary for clinical duties is covered from other sources.

Within this award, a fellow who is undertaking the role full-time may undertake up to two half day clinical sessions a week in addition to any research based clinical sessions taking place as part of their research project, or may spend up to six hours a week on other commitments (e.g. teaching, demonstrating, other funded projects). We recognise the challenges faced by clinical staff in combining research training with the demands of a clinical career and the Fellowship will therefore be managed as flexibly as possible, with the fellow’s clinical commitment negotiable depending on the speciality and the needs of the research at specific times.

In addition to the two clinical half day sessions, where appropriate opportunities are available, fellows may be allowed to take on additional clinical shifts, paid for by the respective clinical specialties. Permission to do this will need to be obtained from both their primary supervisors and the BRC. This will be granted as long as the fellow can demonstrate that this work will not interfere with completion of their research training.

Applicants to the pre-doctoral scheme should:

• Hold a registered primary medical professional qualification (e.g. MBBS).
• Be undertaking their specialty training or equivalent (in the case of medically-qualified applicants, it would be desirable to have completed their Membership of the Royal College of Surgeons).
• Applicants must be at an appropriate point in their clinical training to undertake this placement and they should have clear plans for the completion of their specialty training (but not be at consultant level yet). Applicants should consult their deanery about: undertaking an OOPR, their plans to complete specialty training before developing an application, and possible dates for going out of programme. We understand this can take some time, so early discussions with your deanery are strongly encouraged.
• Demonstrate their ambition to pursue a clinical academic career path and be able to provide evidence of any previous research experience. Candidates do not need to have held a previous position with formal research time (e.g. an academic foundation or academic clinical fellowship (ACF) post), but some previous research experience to provide evidence that a candidate is prepared is helpful.
• Not yet hold a PhD. Candidates who have started a PhD (or equivalent) may be considered, however please get in touch to discuss your circumstances before starting an application.
• Be able to provide recent evidence that their spoken and written command of the English language is adequate for the Fellowship for which they have applied, if they are not nationals of a majority English speaking country, in line with academic institution requirements.
• For those candidates who do not have an automatic right to work and reside in the UK, please be advised that you will require a Tier 2 Sponsorship for this role.

Following the projects adoption process, we will advertise the fellowships externally to invite applications from surgical trainees.

Shortlisting process will involve a panel consisting of surgeons and researchers from all involved organisations, GOSH BRC representatives, and external reviewers. Shortlisted applicants will be interviewed by the programme panel.

Successful candidates will select projects and will be paired up with supervisors on the basis of the outline projects in the portfolio and their specific interests. Top selected students will get priority to their choice of a project. Supervisors will work together with the student on a full project proposal which will be submitted for final approval by their respective organisation as required by the R&D offices.

Please contact brc@gosh.nhs.uk if you have any questions about the call.