Research Assistant in Biophysics focusing on virus structures and functions

Are you interested in working with virus structures and functions, with the support of competent and friendly colleagues in an international environment? Are you looking for an employer that invests in sustainable employeeship and offers safe, favourable working conditions? We welcome you to apply for a research assistant position at Uppsala University.

The Department of Cell and Molecular Biology is organized into seven research programmes which all focus on different areas of cell and molecular biology: Computational Biology and Bioinformatics, Microbiology and Immunology, Molecular Biology, Molecular Biophysics, Molecular Evolution, Molecular Systems Biology and Structural Biology. The scientific basis of what we do lies in biology, but our research overlaps with other areas such as medicine, computer science, mathematics, chemistry, engineering sciences and physics. In total, we are over 200 staff and ~60 Ph.D. students. Please read more about the department’s work at https://icm.uu.se.

The position is placed in Kenta Okamoto’s research group at the Molecular Biophysics program. The research program focuses on single particle imaging of biomolecules using X-ray free electron laser and cryo-electron microscopy (cryo-EM), to reveal their functional 3D structures and the dynamics. In a part of our projects, we study structure-functions of viruses that threaten our environment and health using cryo-EM and other molecular approaches. The project will include studying infection and intraparticle genome synthesis of non-enveloped dsRNA viruses. Please see our program homepage to find more details: https://www.icm.uu.se/molecular-biophysics

Duties
The employee will be a part of the ongoing research project supported by Swedish Research Council. As a research assistant within the project you will support producing and purifying viruses/viral protein complexes for cryo-EM single particle analysis, and doing experiments using established approaches such as infectious clones of viruses.

Requirements
A Master of Science in natural sciences or equivalent. You should have an academic background in molecular biology focusing on viruses and the structures. You should also have experience on gene cloning and mutagenesis, protein and virus purifications, and quantitative PCR. The candidate should be able to work well as part of a team but also independently, and be proficient in both written and spoken English.

Additional qualifications
Experience in virus research using infectious cloning is considered an advantage.

About the employment
The employment is a temporary position, 12 months. Scope of employment 100 %. Starting date as agreed. Placement: Uppsala

For further information about the position, please contact: Kenta Okamoto, 073-765-9434, kenta.okamoto@icm.uu.se

Please submit your application by 8th May, 2024, UFV-PA 2024/1316.

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