Impact of a fungal probiotic on the gut microbiota in basal, and induced dysbiotic environments

 Employer:

A 2 years Postdoctoral position is available starting in February-March 2019 in our Institute (INRA Jouy en Josas). Our researches aim at understanding how the fungal and bacterial gut microbiota and the host interact in a variety of conditions from broad-spectrum antimicrobial treatments, intestinal inflammation or diet modifications. The comprehension of these relationships will help us design new approaches for diseases remediation. Eventually our research will provide means for development of next generation probiotics. We offer a stimulating scientific environment in a young team with state of the art equipment (germ-free/conventional animal platforms, microscopy, proteomics and genomics facilities), and a very active international and collaborative network.

Scientific goal and Strategy:

The intestinal microbiota has been showed to play major roles in human physiology as well as in numerous diseases. Although the bacterial part of the gut microbiota has started to be studied in different pathology, very little data is available regarding the fungal part. In this project we will study more particularly how the fungal microbiota is impacted by a broad-spectrum antimicrobial treatments. And how both fungal and bacterial microbiota are influenced by the use of a fungal probiotic. Similar approaches will also be applied to describe the interkingdom relationship and the effect of antibiotics and fungal probiotic in an already disturbed environment such as a host with a metabolic syndrome.

Wild type, KO mice will be used in combination with bacterial and fungal microbiota genomic analyses, metatranscriptomics and targeted metabolomics. Mice models of metabolic disease will also be used.

Partners involved: The position is a two-year appointment funded through collaboration between a private company and INRA, INSERM, UPMC and APHP.

The postdoctoral scientist will work in Harry’s Sokol group in the Probihote team (www.micalis.fr/ and Site Google-Harry Sokol)  of the INRA research center of Jouy-en-Josas (close to Paris) and in close collaboration with the INSERM U1157 lab (Saint Antoine Hospital, Paris). The position is vacant from February 2019 on a full-time basis.

Required skills:

The project will require a wide variety of techniques including animal experimentation, microbiology, 16S and ITS2 microbiota sequence analysis, transcriptomic analysis, immunology, and metabolism. The candidate should have a recent PhD, be technically accomplished and have a strong knowledge in animal experimentation and at least basic skills in microbiology. Skills in microbiota studies (bioinformatics) would be a strong additional asset. The candidate should have the required authorization to perform animal experiments.