The National Food Institute (DTU Food) offers a 3.5 years position as postdoc in molecular microbiology and ecology of the intestine. You will be part of the Research group for Gut, Microbes and Health. We offer an ambitious, dynamic and sociable research environment with lots of exiting challenges and opportunities.

Responsibilities and tasks

The postdoctoral position is affiliated to two different projects within our research group. The project ‘Novel alternatives to antibiotics by mining human gut microbiome data’ (1 year) has as its goal to identify novel substances with antibiotic effects, based on metagenomic data from human fecal samples. This is a collaboration with bioinformaticians at Copenhagen University, and your part will be focused on wet-lab evaluations of inhibitory effects of the novel substances.

The other project that you will work on, is ‘Center for Fecal Microbiota Transplantation’ (2.5 years). This is a collaboration with Aarhus University Hospital, and your part will revolve around sequence-based and other analyses of samples from patients suffering from infection with Clostridium difficile, and transplanted with feces from healthy donors.

You will work in a multi-disciplinary team and will be responsible for driving the progress of the microbiological work within the two projects described above.

The work will for example involve:

• as part of the research group for Gut, Microbes and Health to contribute to the overall activities, strategies and development of this group
• implementation and application of the microbiological assays for testing of inhibitory effects of microbes microbial compounds under gut-like conditions
• putatively cloning of specific genes responsible for microbial inhibition into new bacterial hosts in order to optimize expression
• 16S rRNA amplicon sequencing-based analysis of microbial communities from humans before and after transplantations with feces from healthy donors to cure recurrent C. diff infection
• bioinformatic analysis with the purposes of understanding the microbial ecology resulting from fecal transplantation and strategies for identifying optimal donor-recipient matches
• dissemination of methods and results in the form of conference contributions and scientific publications

Qualifications

• candidates should have a PhD degree or equivalent
• we expect that you have a solid background in life science and intestinal microbial ecology

Required skills include:

• experience with sequence-based analysis of bacterial intestinal communities
• deep knowledge about intestinal bacterial metabolism and putative interaction with the host

Additionally, the candidate we seek

• has an interest in working with highly complex topics
• is capable of working highly independently
• is motivated by both personal and team accomplishments
• thrives on multidisciplinary collaboration

We offer

DTU is a leading technical university globally recognized for the excellence of its research, education, innovation and scientific advice. We offer a rewarding and challenging job in an international environment. We strive for academic excellence in an environment characterized by collegial respect and academic freedom tempered by responsibility.

Salary and terms of employment

The appointment will be based on the collective agreement with the Danish Confederation of Professional Associations. The allowance will be agreed with the relevant union.You can read more about career paths at DTU here. http://www.dtu.dk/english/about/job-and-career/working-at-dtu/career-paths

Workplace and period of employment:

The workplace will be at the Life Science & Bioengineering building specifically designed to accommodate and facilitate our activities. The building is located at the DTU main campus in Kgs. Lyngby at the outskirt of Copenhagen.

The period of employment is 3.5 years. Anticipated starting date is April 1st.

Further information

Further information may be obtained from Professor and research group leader Tine Rask Licht +45 3588 7186, trli@food.dtu.dk. You can read more about DTU Food on http://www.food.dtu.dk http://www.food.dtu.dk/