Staff Scientist (AC-TAP) in experimental animal research

The Center for Immunology of Viral infections (CiViA) at the Department of Biomedicine, Aarhus University (AU), invites applications for a position as academic technical scientist in the area of animal research as per

1 June 2023

or as soon as possible thereafter. The position is event-restricted, and the duration of the post is estimated at

24 months

full-time, with possible extension.

We offer a vibrant and stimulating international research environment, and a friendly and welcoming atmosphere within the group and the wider Department.

About CiViA and the Department

CiViA has recently been established at AU as a new Center of Excellence, with funding from the Danish National Research Foundation (DNRF). Understanding how the immune system fights viruses represents one of the main challenges in modern-day science. At CiViA, we study the first line of defense against viral infections, with the goal of describing hitherto unrecognized layers of the immune system and novel mechanisms mediating anti-viral defense. CiViA consists of five research groups based at AU and at the Technical University Munich (TUM) in Germany, covering a wide range of methods and techniques in basic and clinical immunology.

The Department of Biomedicine at the Faculty of Health employs approximately 500 people and includes a range of research areas within Biomedicine. We contribute to the Bachelor’s degree programs in medicine, molecular medicine, odontology, and the Master’s degree programs in biomedical engineering and medical chemistry. Our infrastructure is well developed with modern laboratories, core and animal facilities.

You can read more about the department

here

 and about the faculty

here

.

Job description

You will contribute to the center by participating in research projects focusing on immune responses to viral infections in mice.  You will be involved in projects from different laboratories within CiViA. You will join a multi-disciplinary research team working on understanding the mechanisms driving viral disease and the effects of different interventions. Your tasks will be to support various laboratory analyses (mainly qPCR and histology), experimental animal studies, data handling and analyses. You will be expected to contribute to and support the ongoing research projects in CiViA on an

ad hoc

basis and to support the lab management. In your daily work, you will work under the supervision of Associate Professor Line Reinert and in close collaboration with senior academic staff in the laboratory.

Your main tasks will be to:

• Prepare and participate in the execution of research projects for the core facility.
• Communicate and report laboratory results in a professional manner.
• Conduct routine and standardized experiments, using advanced research techniques specific to subject matter of the research project.
• Develop and characterize new virus infection methods.
• Test virus infection in different gene-modified animals or with pharmaceutical reagents.
• Some degree of weekend work will be required (only few hours/weekend-day).
• Perform other duties as assigned.

You will report to Professor Søren Riis Paludan and Associate Professor Line Reinert.

Within the 24 month of employment, we expect you to master the mouse models already running in the core facility, and we expect you to have implemented and characterized 1-2 additional mouse virus infection models.

Your profile

Preferably, you have:

• A Master’s/PhD degree and passed a Laboratory Animal Science course.
• Familiarity with experiments in animals.
• Experience in qPCR, histology, imaging, and animal surgery is not required but will be considered as an advantage.
• Excellent organizational skills, with the ability to deal with and prioritize a range of ongoing tasks at the same time, and to cope under pressure.

As interactions with users of the animal core facility are a crucial part of the position, we expect applicants to be positive, interactive, service-minded and with a supportive mind-set, and to see it as a goal to move the users’ research projects forward. Therefore, you should have good interpersonal skills, are friendly and helpful, and can contribute to a good work environment.

You should be fluent in oral and written English, which is the preferred language in the laboratory, at meetings and in seminars.

Questions about the position

If you have any questions about the position, please contact Professor Søren Riis Paludan (T: +45 28992066; E:

[email protected]

) or Associate Professor Line Reinert (E:

[email protected]

).

Your place of work will be the Department of Biomedicine, The Skou Building, DK-8000 Aarhus C, Denmark.

The application deadline is

1 April 2023

, and we expect to conduct interviews in the week 11-14 April 2023.