PhD student
Department of Ophthalmology
100%
Department of Ophthalmology
Start of employment: 01.01.2025 or by agreement,
3 years
The Department of Ophthalmology at the Inselspital is a leading center for state-of-the-art diagnostics, therapy and microsurgery of eye diseases and ophthalmologic emergencies and scientifically associated with the Department for Biomedical Research (DBMR) at the University of Bern.
The research group Retinal Remodeling (Prof. Dr. Volker Enzmann) focuses on the employment of Müller cells, the main macroglia in the retina, as potential candidates for replacing degenerated photoreceptors. Thereby, we investigating the active modulation of Müller cell transition as a pivotal process during degeneration/regeneration and the treatment of the chronic gliosis in mice with anti-fibrotic drugs as we found similarities to wound healing (fibrosis). Additionally, we have established a human retinal organoid degeneration model where we want to model photoreceptor and glial pathologies to study the role of Müller cell response.
1) pathway analysis in animal models with retinal degeneration (laser, sodium iodate)
2) investigating cell type-associated differential gene expression
3) pharmacological treatment and/or gene editing in regard to the identified pathways
The experimental spectrum of the PhD project will include classic methods in molecular and cell biology as well as in vivo experiments including mice and zebrafish and iPSC-derived or other cell-based systems. Furthermore, bioinformatic evaluation of the data in collaboration w/ computer scientists will occur.
Prof. Dr. Volker Enzmann, volker.enzmann@insel.ch, +41 31 6328935.
Please send your application with the usual documents electronically to the following e-mail address: volker.enzmann@insel.ch