Clinical veterinary fellowships now open for 2008
16 September 2008
In September 2007, the Trust launched a new £10.7m initiative to support a range of activities designed to encourage veterinarians to take up research careers. The award included provision for three fellowship schemes, which enable veterinarians to develop a career combining both laboratory-based research and clinical practice.
These fellowships, which are awarded annually, are now open for 2008.
The three fellowships support veterinary graduates at a number of early career stages. Veterinary Research Entry Fellowships support those who wish to undertake research leading to a Master's degree. Integrated Training Fellowships for Veterinarians help graduates obtain a laboratory-based PhD and clinical training. Veterinary Postdoctoral Fellowships enable graduates with PhDs to continue their research interests at a postdoctoral level in a UK veterinary school.
Dr Richard Mellanby received a Wellcome Trust Veterinary Postdoctoral Fellowship in 2008. He is currently undertaking a postdoc at the University of Edinburgh to examine T-cell tolerance in experimental autoimmune encephalitis - a commonly used disease model for multiple sclerosis.
He says: "The support offered by the Wellcome Trust is absolutely crucial to the veterinary profession. I am personally extremely grateful for the fellowship I received, which has allowed me to further develop my research career. For people like me - who have both clinical qualifications and a PhD - it can be very difficult to get support at a salary level that makes a research career possible.
"Without support like this, it is extremely hard for veterinary clinical scientists to undertake high-quality postdoctoral research, and the wider profession is indebted to the Wellcome Trust for the leadership they have shown in supporting academic veterinarians."
For more information on these fellowships and other Trust funding open to veterinarians, see our veterinary research page.
Image: Petri dishes regularly arranged so that a robotically controlled machine can pick off colonies of the bacteria E. coli; Wellcome Library, London