2 PhD positions at the School for Mental Health and Neuroscience (MH&NS) in Netherlands | Maastricht University

In the context of the NWO-funded Graduate School, applicants are encouraged to design their own PhD project. To this end, the application process entails two stages. Based on materials submitted during the first stage, applicants whose backgrounds and interests indicate a good fit with relevant research lines within MH&NS and collaborating EURON institutions will be invited to participate in the second stage of the application process. Here, applicants will be able to contact potential MH&NS PhD supervisors to identify a research topic that can be developed into a preliminary research proposal. Successful applicants for the two PhD positions will later develop their proposals, under supervision, into the actual research projects. These two projects will be a part of the existing translational research lines within MH&NS.

One of the goals of research within MH&NS is to understand how the brain mediates behavioural adaptation to the environment, and high higher order mental, motor and sensory processes converge to guide adaptive behaviour in complex ways. Individual differences in mentation and behaviour are related to (epi)genetic variation and early environmental influences with enduring developmental impact. Research in MH&NS attempts to trace the origin of cognitive, motor, sensory and behavioural dysfunction to interacting genetic and environmental influences, and to elucidate the biological and mental mechanisms between aetiology and symptoms. We focus on common biological pathways such as epigenetics, neuroplasticity, neuronal excitability, neurodegeneration, inflammation, and cerebrovascular regulation, attempt to establish how they subserve early imbalance in mentation and functional abilities of the central nervous system (cognition, emotion, incentive salience, movement and pain perception), finally resulting in diagnosable mental and neurological syndromes requiring treatment. Thus basically we cover the entire framework within neuroscience, starting from genetics, to epigenetics, proteomics, morphology, imaging and behaviour.

Requirements

• (Research) Master’s degree in molecular and cellular biology, neuroscience, medicine, psychology, or epidemiology from an internationally accredited university;
• Research experience with fundamental neuroscience and/or clinical neuroscience;
• Interest (preferably experience) in combining basic neuroscience with more clinically oriented approaches such as epidemiology, intervention studies, imaging studies etc.;
• Good computer skills, including statistical analysis;
• Excellent English writing and presentation skills;
• Motivation to work in a multidisciplinary environment.

Conditions of employment

The terms of employment of Maastricht University are set out in the Collective Labour Agreement of Dutch Universities (CAO). Furthermore, local UM provisions also apply.

The appointment will be on a temporary basis for a maximum period of four years and should lead to a dissertation (PhD thesis).

The full-time gross monthly salary will range from € 2.083,00 in the first year up to € 2.664,00 in the fourth year, according to the PhD salary scales of the Collective Labour Agreement of Dutch Universities (CAO).

Organisation

Maastricht University is renowned for its unique, innovative, problem-based learning system, which is characterized by a small-scale and student-oriented approach. Research at UM is characterized by a multidisciplinary and thematic approach, and is concentrated in research institutes and schools. Maastricht University has around 15,000 students and 4,000 employees. Reflecting the university's strong international profile, a fair amount of both students and staff are from abroad. The university hosts 6 faculties: Faculty of Health, Medicine and Life Sciences, Faculty of Law, School of Business and Economics, Faculty of Humanities and Sciences, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience.

Department

School for Mental Health and Neuroscience

MH&NS is one of the five research schools of the Faculty of Health, Medicine and Life Sciences at Maastricht University and the MUMC+, and consists of three Divisions that closely work together: Cognitive Neuropsychiatry and Clinical Neuroscience (Division 1), Mental Health (Division 2) and Neuroscience (Division 3). MH&NS conducts translational neuroscience research in collaboration with the departments of Psychiatry & Neuropsychology, Neurology, Neurosurgery, Anaesthesiology, Neurophysiology, Radiology, Paediatrics, Ophthalmology, Urology, and Ear-Nose-Throat Medicine, which have merged their research efforts into the three divisions of MH&NS, while converging almost all of the laboratory neuroscience techniques within one central laboratory facility. MH&NS furthermore collaborates with the Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience (FPN) at UM and has successfully created enduring academic infrastructure with several large academic health care partners in the region: three large academic mental health institutions (RIAGG Maastricht and Mondriaan), the Alzheimer Centrum Limburg, and a large academic service for epilepsy (ACE, Kempenhaeghe). The Graduate School of Translational Neuroscience is centred around and coordinated by MH&NS. The euregional infrastructure of the NWO Graduate School of Translational Neuroscience entails research and educational activities in the area of Translational Neuroscience in MH&NS in collaboration with the University of Hasselt (Belgium), the RWTH University Aachen (Germany) and the Catholic University of Louvain (together with the University Psychiatric Centre in Kortenberg; Belgium). The central aim of this Graduate School, funded by the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO), is to train excellent researchers, who are able to use multi- and interdisciplinary approaches in bridging the gap between fundamental and clinical neuroscience. We would like to stimulate projects that discover novel determinants and mechanisms underlying neurodegenerative disease onset and course, as well as those that develop new strategies for prevention and treatment.