
How to apply
Apply for a joint PhD with the Toronto-Melbourne Research Training Group.
This is one of two research projects on bioengineering. KU Leuven is the home institution for this project. To view the Melbourne-based partner project, click here.
Cell-based products are being used with great impact in a wide diversity of both novel and long-established therapeutic applications. Erythrocytes, for example, are used to save thousands of lives every day worldwide. Yet, in low- and middle-income countries, their scarcity and unsafe control are endemic burdens that cost lives. Conversely, the high price tag of CAR-T cell products relegates such therapies to last-resort treatments even in developed countries. Therefore, synthetic strategies (i.e. artificial cells) could make such cell products safer and cheaper. In the paradigmatic case of Erythrocytes, the properties of their cytoskeleton are essential to establish and regulate blood flow, which in turn ensures adequate tissue oxygenation. These properties originate from their cortex, a “nanoscopic chassis” composed of multiple proteins that stabilize and anchors the cellular membrane above it. Attempts to reconstruct a similar cortex within giant unilamellar vesicles (GUVs) have so far delivered poor results with structures that cannot recover the properties of native Erythrocyte cortices.
In this project, we will adapt droplet-based microfluidic strategies for the formation of GUVs to integrate them with a “3D nano-printed” biomimetic cortex. Such structures will be obtained via 2-photon nano-lithographic techniques that have been demonstrated to offer the capacity to pattern nanometric scaffolds with dimensions similar to those of native cellular cortices. We will further characterize the physicochemical and functional properties of these cortex-stabilized GUVs in order to artificially recover specific properties (such as shape, deformability and gas exchange capacity) of native Erythrocytes.
This project aims to achieve two main breakthroughs:
To achieve these breakthroughs, we will deploy the following work plan:
KU Leuven: Professor Xavier Casadevall i Solvas
The University of Melbourne: Dr David Collins
*Click on the researcher's name above to learn more about their publication and grant successes.
We are seeking a PhD candidate with the following skills:
The PhD candidate will benefit from the combined expertise of the project supervisors, and the embedding into two research environments.
Dr David Collins and Professor Xavier Casadevall i Solvas will lead the research teams in UoM and KUL, respectively. Professor Casadevall i Solvas will provide expertise in artificial cell generation (for both topics) and activities related to the integration of biomimetic scaffolds. Professor Bart Smeets and Professor Jeroen Lammertyn will provide expertise and support from the KUL side in terms of membrane protein integration and dynamics in artificial cells and microdevices/microfluidics. Dr Collins will provide expertise in micro/nanofabrication of biomimetic scaffolds, the development of acoustic microdevices, and numerical simulation. Professor Daniel Scott and Professor Michael Parker will provide support from the UoM side in the form of expertise in mechanosensitive and pore-forming membrane proteins, respectively.
This PhD project will be based at KU Leuven with a minimum 12-month stay at the University of Melbourne.
The candidate will be enrolled in the PhD program at the Faculty of Bioscience Engineering/Biosystems at KU Leuven, and in the PhD program at the School of Chemical and Biomedical Engineering at the University of Melbourne.
To apply for this joint PhD opportunity, and to view the entry requirements, visit How to apply.
Apply for a joint PhD with the Toronto-Melbourne Research Training Group.
Discover what researchers from the KU Leuven - Melbourne Joint PhD are working on right now.
Hear the stories of current and past graduate researchers. Find out about their experiences at the University and where their degrees have taken them.
Find a supervisor at the University of Melbourne