Post-doc Researcher in Computational Glycobiology

Professor Carme Rovira is looking for a post-doc to work in computational glycobiology. The successful candidate will be applying state-of-art computational methods to model enzymatic reactions and glycan-protein interactions, developing new algorithms and applying them to the analysis of simulation data to aid drug discovery. The successful candidates will work on the prestigious ERC Synergy grant of Prof. Rovira, together with Prof. Gideon J. Davies (University of York) and Prof. Herman S. Overkleeft (University of Leiden). 

The perspective researcher will have the opportunity to work on a very exciting project CARBOCENTRE, which aims at developing novel activity-based probes and competitive inhibitors for carbohydrate-active enzymes of interest in biomedicine and biotechnology. They will address complex enzyme reaction mechanisms and apply sophisticated computational methods and algorithms (ab initio molecular dynamics, quantum mechanics/molecular mechanics methodologies and enhanced sampling techniques). The aim is to utilize computational data to understand catalysis in carbohydrate-active enzymes (CAZymes) and contribute to the design of activity-based probes for disease-relevant CAZymes, diagnosis markers and selective drugs. The successful candidate will join the dynamic research group of Prof. Rovira within the Institute of Theoretical and Computational Chemistry and the Department of Chemistry (IQTC-UB). They will work in a sophisticated HPC environment, will have access to systems and computational infrastructures, and will be involved in collaborations with experts in different areas.

The project is a collaboration of the Department of Chemistry of the University of Barcelona (Spain), the York Structural Biology Laboratory of the University of York (UK) and the Leiden Institute of Chemistry of the University of Leiden (the Netherlands).

The position is available from May 1st , 2024 for a duration of two years (one year, renewable to a second one). The position will be based at the Department of Chemistry of the University of Barcelona (UB) in Barcelona, Spain.

 Key Duties

• Conduct high-quality research
• Publish in high impact journals
• Present research at national and international conferences and meetings
• Collaborate with various research groups across Europe and elsewhere
• Help supervise PhD and MSc students
• Participate in grant writing and organizational activities
• Participate in educational and outreach activities

Gross salary per year: 

We are looking for a highly motivated scientist with research background and expertise in MD, QM/MM methods free-energy simulations.  A biology background, a sound understanding of carbohydrate chemistry and/or organic chemistry reactions, experience in protein modelling, molecular dynamics and enhanced-sampling methods is also necessary.

Additional skills:

• Experience in the modeling of enzyme-catalyzed reactions
• Good publication record for the career stage
• Fluency in spoken and written English
• Good technical skills including molecular dynamics, QM/MM, metadynamics, statistics, scripting and programming.