UCL Institute of Ophthalmology
MSc Bioscience (Research and Development)London, United Kingdom
DURATION
1 year
LANGUAGES
English
PACE
Full time
APPLICATION DEADLINE
31 Jul 2025*
EARLIEST START DATE
Sep 2025
TUITION FEES
GBP 16,000 / per year **
STUDY FORMAT
On-Campus
* applicants who require a visa: 31 July 2025 / Applicants who do not require a visa: 29 August 2025
** UK students|16000 | international| 36.500
Key Summary
Introduction
This program will help you understand how to develop research from the lab to the clinic. With a bioscience background, you will develop your scientific knowledge base whilst improving your ability to design experiments in the context of translational medicine. Understanding clinical trial design in more detail together with improving your critical evaluation of scientific papers and an extended lab-based project will equip you with more knowledge and skills required for pursuing a PhD or other scientific career.
About this degree
The MSc Bioscience (Research and Development) is an intensive, preclinical science-based program intended for those who have a biomedical background, and have an interest in furthering their knowledge and understanding of the development of novel therapies, by learning about therapeutic approaches in stem cell gene therapy, the science of disease and treatment paradigms, engagement with the practical applications of therapies and the translational possibilities within these.
The program is intended to develop practical skills and strategies for shaping their research practice for identifying science-based solutions and innovations and shaping opportunities for these to be developed and actualized in lab-based contexts.
The period of study provides you with an extended period of lab time, which then drives into a term of independent research activity and lab-based practice, ensuring that you will leave with meaningful bench skills and a defined lab-based research project completed, maximizing your capacity to develop your practice further through PhD study/Institutional research or in workplace Laboratory contexts.
Gallery
Ideal Students
Bioscience graduates are encouraged to apply.
Admissions
Scholarships and Funding
Government loans
Some governments offer loans for students pursuing postgraduate study. Check with your home government to see what funding they may offer.
Postgraduate Master's Loan from Student Finance
Some students may be eligible for a Postgraduate Master's Loan from Student Finance. Unlike undergraduate Student Finance, this is a single loan that acts as a contribution towards the cost of study. It is unlikely that it will cover the cost of both tuition fees and maintenance. For courses starting in the 2023/24 academic year, you could get up to £12,167.
The loan is paid to you directly to use in any way you choose. This means you will be responsible for arranging payment of your own tuition fees, as the loan will not go directly to UCL like an undergraduate tuition fee loan.
Eligibility
Information on the loan including full eligibility details can be found on the Student Finance Master's Loan website.
Please note that you must be doing a full standalone Master's of 180 credits to be eligible for the loan. You will not be eligible for the loan if you are studying on a modular/flexible mode of attendance, or are using credits from previous study towards your Master's under UCL's Recognition of Prior Learning scheme.
How your Postgraduate Master's Loan might affect your benefits
If you receive means-tested benefits, 30% of the maximum Postgraduate Master's Loan is treated by the Department for Work and Pensions as being for living costs and hence will be considered income when assessing any benefit award. For benefit purposes, you will be treated as having this amount, regardless of whether you actually take up the loan.
Curriculum
The Bioscience (Research and Development) MSc program is structured through a blend of compulsory and optional modules.
This allows a substantial base of key skills, knowledge, and understanding to be developed intensively, while also allowing specialist lines of inquiry to develop in respect to shaping individual areas of research.
The diet of the optional modules from across UCL departments ensures a genuine translational approach is embedded and provides a focus on research-driven identification of therapeutic problems to solve, through the range of current and emerging treatment innovations.
Study moves from compulsory taught modules in term one with a core skills and knowledge focus, to a diet of options in term two which allows you to construct your learning according to your evolving areas of research interest. This research interest is then focused and interrogated through a lab-based research project based module in term 3 which will consolidate and expand your practical bench skills.
The primary location of study provides a distinctive environment in which to learn as the institute has a strong record. The institute’s record in innovating therapies through research to implementation is longstanding and globally recognized. The collaborative relationship between the institute and Moorfields Eye Hospital, not only provides a coherent microcosm of the direct application of research into clinical use, it also affords a particular insight into bench-to-bedside research in practice. The Institute of Ophthalmology's relationships with global partner institutions affords you a contextual understanding of how research in this field is not only translational in application but transnational in its engagement with global health challenges and solutions.
The Research Project, which forms the final assessment, develops your independent lab practice substantially; working from the science-based identification of need into shaping and realizing research that may inform therapeutic innovations in the future that could transform treatments and lives in the context of a global society.
Summative assessments are taken in the form of:
- Written Exams
- Coursework Essays
- Written Reports
- Coursework Portfolio
- Presentations
- Abstract/Grant Proposal Writing
- Independent Research Projects/Dissertations
- Research Presentation and Panel Questions
- Reflective Evaluation
Compulsory Modules
- Research in Practice
- Science of Diseases
- Stem Cells and Eye Repair
- Disease Models in Research
- Research Project and Lab Skills
Optional Modules
- Molecular Aspects of Cell and Gene Therapy
- Novel Therapies: From Concept to Clinical Translation
- Immunodeficiency and Therapeutics
- Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics
- Advanced Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics
- Pharmacology of Inflammation (Extended)
- Pharmacology of Inflammation
- Pharmacogenomics, Adverse Drug Reactions and Biomarkers
Program Outcome
The program will utilise the expertise available at the institute given that staff are all mainly translational researchers across the life sciences.
The program is also predicated on you being able to shape your own area of interest from a suite of optional modules delivered by other UCL departments. The location allows students to place their learning on this program in a context that explicitly consolidates research into translational practice and implementation.
The program provides you with an intensively taught curriculum, which then feeds into periods of independent research activity, ensuring that you will leave with substantial lab-based skills and a research portfolio, maximizing your capacity to develop your practice further through Ph.D. study/institutional research or in workplace laboratory contexts.
Career Opportunities
Graduates from this programme will have:
- A systematic understanding of research and therapeutics, and a critical awareness of current problems and new insights informed by current research and practice at the forefront of the field.
- A comprehensive understanding of the techniques and processes that drive both research practice and the therapies themselves.
- A capacity to apply and generate new knowledge through their own research, with a practical integration of established techniques of research and inquiry in this area, and the potential to innovate new models for research in practice.
Employability
Graduates from this programme will also have:
- The capacity to critically appraise existing research, methodologies, and processes for developing therapies
- The ability to formulate and evaluate complex decisions, solutions, and communications of their findings
- The autonomy to initiate, plan, and actualize effective research projects independently
- The potential to advance their learning and skillset, and to undertake further research and practice in both subsequent study and employment
- Effective written and verbal communication skills, which support information and data management
- A substantial individual research project, based on lab practice and experience
Networking
You will be invited to the annual ECR symposium which showcases PhD and post doctoral research projects. You will be working in labs alongside PhD students and post-doctoral researchers. You will be sharing modules from other MSc programs across UCL and meeting other MSc students during those sessions.