Research Associate in Engineering Biology

The role

This Postdoctoral Research Associate (PDRA) position will combine a mixture of genetic part design, massively parallel reporter assays, nanopore sequencing, and the development of new tools and methods for engineering cyanobacteria for environmental bio-restoration applications. It will build on advances within our team to develop methods that can create the vast data sets needed for machine learning approaches for biological design, and the PDRA will work closely with data scientists at the University of Edinburgh to build predictive models that can accelerate the design of genetic circuits in cyanobacteria.

The PDRA will be based in the School of Biological Sciences at the University of Bristol and will work as part of the Biocompute Lab. They will join a vibrant and growing biodesign community at the University of Bristol through affiliation with the Bristol BioDesign Institute and become an integral part of the newly established UK-wide CYBER project team. This role will require a PDRA who is interested in developing new methods for engineering non-model organisms using advanced quantitative and high-throughput assays.

What will you be doing?

You will design and assemble large genetic part/circuit libraries for cyanobacteria and test the performance of these using high-throughput cell sorting and sequencing methods. This data will form the input to computational models to fine-tune gene expression and establish a new toolkit for gene expression control in cyanobacteria. This toolkit will then be used to develop engineered cyanobacteria with phenotypes that enable the sequestering of pollutants from the environment and simplified extraction through inducible floatation. Overall, the project will include a diverse range of elements covering both laboratory experiments and computational analyses.

You should apply if

You have extensive experience working with microbes (ideally diverse types), a real passion for engineering biology, a demonstrated ability to pick up new skills and work well in a diverse, multidisciplinary team, and an interest in taking your research towards real-world impact. Hands-on experience assembling DNA libraries, high-throughput experiments, and nanopore sequencing would be beneficial but is not essential. Start date is flexible, but we would like to hire as soon as possible.

Additional information

For informal enquiries please contact: Dr. Thomas Gorochowski (thomas.gorochowski@bristol.ac.uk)

Relevant publications:

[1] Tarnowski M.J. & Gorochowski T.E. Massively parallel characterisation of engineered transcript isoforms using direct RNA sequencing. Nature Communications 13, 434 (2022).

https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-022-28074-5

[2] Gilliot P.A.& Gorochowski T.E. Sequencing enabling design and learning in synthetic biology. Current Opinion in Chemical Biology 58, 54-62 (2020).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cbpa.2020.06.002

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