A Swansea University student has secured a major new scholarship worth more than £100,000 to further his studies.
Ben Williams is one of four inaugural winners of the Sir David Jack PhD Scholarship run by the British Pharmacological Society.
The scholarship is the first of 40 PhD projects supported over the next decade which aim to foster the next generation of pharmacologists and therapeutic innovators. It has been made possible by a generous donation from the family of the late Sir David Jack, the pioneering pharmacologist who developed life-changing asthma medications.
Ben, from Llanelli, graduated with a BSc in Biology from Swansea and is currently an MSc by Research student within the Medical School. He plans to begin his PhD studies in October, and the scholarship will cover his course fees, research costs of up to £10,000 per year, a stipend through his PhD studies and support to attend scientific meetings – worth around £110,000.
He said: “It is a phenomenal academic and personal honour to be awarded this scholarship in its inaugural year. I would like to thank the Society for seeing something in me and providing the opportunity to further myself as an independent researcher in pharmacology and toxicology with this award.
“Thank you to my supervisors, past, present and those soon to be for the continued support and wealth of knowledge that has been provided, enabling me to be here today.”
Ben applied for the scholarship with support from his supervisory team of Dr Aidan Seeley, Professor Martin Clift, and Dr Sophie Reed. His PhD will see him investigating the effects of active pharmaceutical ingredients in the environment using the invertebrate model, Lumbriculus variegatus, within Swansea Worm Integrative Research Lab (SWIRL).
Dr Seeley, programme director of Swansea’s Medical Pharmacology degrees and Principal Investigator within SWIRL, said: “This is a fantastic result for Ben, the supervisory team, SWIRL and for the Medical School. It really does demonstrate the calibre of students that we produce here in Swansea.”
