Overview
Primary supervisor: Dr Rose Davidson. Dupuytren’s disease bends the fingers irreversibly into the palm, threatening employment, self-care and independence. With genetic risk variants linked to the disorder, the project aims to understand how these DNA changes affect disease progression and post-operative recurrence risk. This PhD project uses CRISPR/Cas9 to examine risk variants in patient-derived cells and measure how variants alter force generation, myofibroblast transition and extracellular matrix deposition to contract the fingers. These single cell readouts may reveal the contributions of variants to disease progression and severity, enabling patients and surgeons to make better informed decisions about the timing of surgical intervention and identifying molecular switches that could be targeted by anti-fibrotic drugs.
You will master genome editing, human iPSC culture and directed differentiation, live cell biomechanical imaging, and multiomics analysis skills that are valued across academia, biotech and the regenerative medicine sector. By integrating benchtop discoveries with a growing clinical/genetic registry of real patients, your findings can feed directly into precision surgery algorithms and clinical trials. Few PhD projects offer such a clear line of sight from variant to mechanism to clinical translation.
Location and supervision
Located on the thriving Norwich Research Park, you will join the teams of Dr Rose Davidson (UEA) and Dr James Smith (UEA) with insights from Miss Mira Pecheva (NHS Orthopaedic Hand Surgeon) offering a blend of cell biology, stem cell engineering, biophysics and clinical orthopaedics. You will be based in the Norwich Medical School and Metabolic Health Department, with a strong mentoring culture and career development support.
Responsibilities
* Employ CRISPR/Cas9 to investigate risk variants in patient-derived cells.
* Measure how variants alter force generation, myofibroblast transition and extracellular matrix deposition.
* Perform quantitative single-cell readouts to illuminate variant contributions to disease progression and severity.
* Integrate benchtop discoveries with clinical/genetic registry data to inform precision surgery approaches and potential clinical trials.
* Develop skills in genome editing, iPSC culture and directed differentiation, live cell biomechanical imaging, and multiomics analysis.
Qualifications and entry requirements
Entry requirements
The minimum entry requirement is 2:1 in Biological Sciences, Biomedical Science, Biomedicine or similar. Experience with iPSC culture, microscopy and biophysics research is desirable.
Funding and mode of study
Funding
This PhD opportunity offers funding for three years and comprises tuition fees at Home fee rate, an annual stipend for maintenance starting at £21,611 in the first academic year, and £1,000 per annum to support research training.
Mode of study: Full-time
Start date: 1 February 2026
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