Bioscience students are encouraged to apply.

The Bioscience (Research and Development) with Practice 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 taught options in term two which allow you to construct your learning according to your evolving areas of research interest. This research interest is then focused and interrogated through a research project-based module in term three which will expand lab-based skills. In terms four and five there will be a more extensive lab placement either at the institute or with an international partner institution which will provide additional lab expertise within an academic environment and foster academic collaboration.

There will be a preliminary module focused on preparing a grant funding application around the proposed project, allowing a thorough understanding of the background science and implementation of grant writing skills taught in year one, and a reflective module that will ask you to appraise and evidence your practical bench and lab skills. The research project itself will be conducted in term five.

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 afford you direct experience 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 Dissertation Project, which forms the final assessment, develops your independent practice substantially; working from the science-based identification of need into shaping, realising, and reporting your research that could inform therapeutic innovations in the future that might transform treatments and lives in the context of a global society

Compulsory modules

• Research in Practice
• Grant Application Proposal
• Science of Diseases
• Reflective Evaluation e-portfolio
• Lab-Based Research Project Dissertation
• Disease Models in Research
• Research Project and Lab Skills

Optional modules

• Advanced Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics
• Clinical Pharmacology and Therapeutics
• Immunodeficiency and Therapeutics
• Pharmacogenomics, Adverse Drug Reactions and Biomarkers
• Novel Therapies: From Concept to Clinical Translation
• Molecular Aspects of Cell and Gene Therapy
• Pharmacology of Inflammation
• Pharmacology of Inflammation (Extended)

The program will utilize the expertise available at the institute given that staff are all mainly translational researchers across the life sciences and includes the offer of a placement with global partner institutions.

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 for students to place their learning on this program in a context that explicitly consolidates research into translational practice and implementation.

The extended period of study (18 months) provides you with an intensive taught curriculum, which then feeds into periods of independent research activity, ensuring that you will leave with substantial lab-based skills in workplace lab contexts and a research portfolio,

This will maximize your capacity to develop your practice further through PhD study/Institutional research or in workplace laboratory contexts.

In terms four and five there will be a more extensive lab placement either at the UCL Institute of Ophthalmology or with an international partner institution which will provide additional lab expertise within an academic environment and foster academic collaboration.

There will be a preliminary module focused on preparing a grant funding application around the proposed project, allowing a thorough understanding of the background science and implementation of grant writing skills taught in year one, and a reflective module that will ask you to appraise and evidence your practical bench and lab skills.

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 which 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 actualise 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 portfolio, based on lab practice and experience

Networking

The opportunity to meet students and scientists working in research institutions overseas will give an insight into the various research practices and learning options globally.

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.