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Research Associate Fellow in Respiratory Medicine

Guy's and St Thomas' NHS Foundation Trust
This job is closed to applications
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Location
Salary
£61,825 - £70,425 per annum
Profession
Medical doctor
Grade
Junior
Deadline
28 Jul 2025
Contract Type
Fixed term: 18 months (N/A)
Posted Date
14 Jul 2025

Job overview

Department Information

This post will be situated between the respiratory infection department at the Royal Brompton hospital, Guy’s and St. Thomas’ NHS Foundation trust and the Shah/Singanayagam laboratories at the Centre of Bacterial Resistance Biology, Imperial College London. The Royal Brompton hospital has the largest cohort of patients with bronchiectasis in Europe with ~2000 individuals with bronchiectasis related to a number of aetiologies including idiopathic, primary and secondary immunodeficiency, primary ciliary dyskinesia, allergic bronchopulmonary aspergillosis and cystic fibrosis.

Main duties of the job

  • To take initiatives in the planning of research
  • To direct the work of small research teams
  • To conduct data analysis
  • To write reports for submission to research sponsors
  • To present findings to colleagues and at conferences
  • To submit publications to refereed journals
  • To provide guidance to PhD Students
  • 1.     Duties and Responsibilities
  • To maintain highly organised and accurate record of experimental work
  • To actively participate in the research programme of the Group
  • To participate in Group research meetings and internal seminars
  • To contribute to the smooth running of the Group’s laboratories and, facilities with other scientists, clinicians, technicians and students within the laboratories
  • Assist in the supervision of undergraduate and postgraduate research students and research assistants as required
  • Any other duties as may be deemed reasonable by Head of group as well as Head of Division/Department/Section

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

  • 1.     Job Summary

The post will be jointly supervised between Dr Anand Shah and Dr Aran Singanayagam. This is a 18 month post funded by an industry collaboration to identify the molecular pathways relevant to disease pathophysiology in the chronic respiratory condition bronchiectasis. The post will use existing ethically approved research projects to obtain clinical samples including upper and lower airway samples from individuals with chronic respiratory disease with a focus on bronchiectasis. A key aspect of the project will be to expand bronchial epithelial samples to be used within multiple analysis techniques and/or assays. In particular, the cultured cells will be used to create different models of disease such air-liquid interface cultures which can be used to study responses both before and after administration of different stimuli (e.g. pathogens or inflammatory ligands) and/or candidate molecules

We are aiming to recruit an enthusiastic, dynamic, and motivated postdoctoral research associate with an interest in host-pathogen interactions, who wishes to expand their research portfolio. You will join an exciting multidisciplinary group with expertise in immunology and molecular microbiology. The post holder will be required to work both individually and as a team and may be required to teach more junior members of the laboratory. You should integrate with the group with a cooperative, enthusiastic and flexible approach.

Essential Requirements:

  • PhD in immunology or equivalent vocational qualification
  • Work independently and be competent in general lab techniques, including cell culture, qPCR, ELISA, WB, bioinformatics and data analysis.

Desirable Requirements:

  • Prior experience in epithelial cell culture including air-liquid interface and/or pulmonary organoid models
  • Prior experience in analysis of large sequencing datasets (bulk RNA-seq) with associated competence in using R or similar analysis packages. 2.     Key Relationships

The postholder will be integrated into the research group led by Dr Anand Shah and Dr Aran Singanayagam with a clinical translational research role across the Royal Brompton hospital and the Centre of Bacterial Resistance Biology, Imperial College London.

Selected papers from the Shah/Singanayagam lab

Almond M, Farne H, K, Jackson MM, Jha A, Katsoulis O (et al)…Johnston SL, Singanayagam A. Obesity dysregulates the pulmonary antiviral immune response. Nature Communications 2023. 14: 6607.

George PM, Reed A, Desai S, Devaraj A, Faiez TS, (et al)…Shah A, Singanayagam A. A persistent neutrophil-associated immune signature characterises post-COVID19 pulmonary sequelae. Science Translational Medicine. 2022; 14: 671

Singanayagam A, Foottit J, Marcyzynski M, Radicioni G, Cross MT et al. Airway mucins promote immunopathology in virus-exacerbated chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. J Clin Invest 2022; 132: e120901.

Kamal F, Kumar S, Edwards MR, Veselkov K, Belluomo I, (et al.)….Singanayagam A, Hanna GB*. Virus-induced volatile organic compounds are detectable in exhaled breath during pulmonary infection. Am J Respir Crit Care Med 2021. 204: 1075-85.

Finney L, Glanville N, Farne H, Aniscenko J, Fenwick P, (et al.)…Johnston SL, Singanayagam A. Inhaled corticosteroids downregulate the SARS-CoV-2 receptor ACE2 in COPD through suppression of type I interferon. J Allerg Clin Immunol 2021; 147: 510-19.

  • To take initiatives in the planning of research
  • To direct the work of small research teams
  • To conduct data analysis
  • To write reports for submission to research sponsors
  • To present findings to colleagues and at conferences
  • To submit publications to refereed journals
  • To provide guidance to PhD Students
  • 3.     Duties and Responsibilities
  • To maintain highly organised and accurate record of experimental work
  • To actively participate in the research programme of the Group
  • To participate in Group research meetings and internal seminars
  • To contribute to the smooth running of the Group’s laboratories and, facilities with other scientists, clinicians, technicians and students within the laboratories
  • Assist in the supervision of undergraduate and postgraduate research students and research assistants as required
  • Any other duties as may be deemed reasonable by Head of group as well as Head of Division/Department/Section