A number of novel lineages of Archaea have recently been discovered and are continuously being discovered mostly through metagenomics. These discoveries have led to new views on the evolution of Archaea and Eukaryotes and the whole tree of life. 

Our division focusses on several of those novel archaeal lineages. We search for the ecological distribution of archaea in diverse ecosystems and characterize so-far uncultivated archaea in laboratory enrichments by studying their physiology, gene expression and genome contents.

We currently seek a highly motivated postdoc to analyse genomes and transcriptomes of archaea from diverse environments and enrichment cultures. The candidate should have strong background in bioinformatic skills connected to next-generation-sequencing methods as relevant for assembling and characterizing microbial genomes and/or for comparative genomics and phylogeny.  Knowledge of microbial genomes and physiology is equally needed.

Qualifications and responsibilities are as follows:

1.    The successful candidate has completed a Ph.D. in biology or bioinformatics and has basic experiences in both fields.
2.    The applicant must have papers in peer-reviewed journals and must be highly motivated.
3.    The applicant must be able to handle different computational tools in the context of microbial ecology and evolution, have experiences in one or more programming languages like Perl/Python/R and should also be able to prepare and present his/her research at scientific conferences.
4.    The applicants are expected to write and edit/revise research manuscripts and be proficient in English communications.

The atmosphere in our laboratory is collaborative and multidisciplinary and we offer internationally competitive salary and benefit. The successful candidate will interact on a daily basis with international colleagues carrying out studies on different areas of research (genetics, genomics, evolution and symbioses) and approaches (cultivation, molecular biology genetic engineering, biochemistry, etc).

The work will be financed in the frame of the European Research Council (ERC) grant TACK Superphylum and Lokiarchaeota Evolution: dissecting the ecology and evolution of archaea to elucidate the prokaryote to eukaryote transition (TACKLE). The position will initially be filled for 1 year with the possibilty of extension of up to 3 years. It will be filled as soon as a suitable candidate has been found.

To apply for this position please send a CV to Christa Schleper and Nathalia Jandl.