Postdoctoral Researcher, Effects of Maternal Microbial Metabolites on Fetal Development

The position will be at the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Department of Veterinary Biosciences, connected to the multidisciplinary HOH Helsinki One Health research network. We are located at Viikki Campus, together with the Faculties of Agriculture and Forestry, Biological and Environmental Sciences, Pharmacy, and life science research units. The research activities at Viikki are supported by state-of-the-art infrastructures including core facilities e.g. for metabolomics, proteomics,  genome analysis, extracellular vesicle research and microscopy, as well as the Viikki Research Farm.

The Faculty of Veterinary Medicine invites applications for the position of a

POSTDOCTORAL RESEARCHER (Effects of maternal microbial metabolites on fetal development)

The appointment is for approximately two years, with the starting date as soon as possible after the recruitment decision is made. The position is filled with a 6 month probationary period.

The appointment is in the Academy of Finland research project led by docent Mikael Niku, in the Developmental Interactions Research Group. The postdoctoral researcher will also visit our collaborating laboratories in Turku and/or Kuopio, to perform metabolomics laboratory analyses. We identify novel microbial metabolites and investigate the impacts of metabolites and extracellular vesicles generated by maternal microbiota on the fetal development of the immune system and central nervous system, in cell culture models, laboratory mice and large animals (including humans).

For more details on our research, please see the website of the Research Group (below).

The appointee will perform research in the project. The appointee may also supervise students and participate in other discipline-specific teaching. Teaching tasks can account for up to 5 % of the annual working time and are quite enjoyable due to our highly motivated students.

We offer

• A compact research group with expert laboratory technicians
• Research project with top scores from the international evaluation panel of the Academy of Finland
• Extensive national and international collaboration network with experts on metabolomics, extracellular vesicles, data analysis, microbiology, veterinary and medical research

We expect

• PhD degree in a relevant field (The degree requirement must be met by the beginning of the employment.)
• Experience in LC-MS based metabolomics
• Fluent communication skills in English
• Curiosity, genuine interest in science, initiative
• Ability to work in a close team and with an extensive collaboration network, and effectively organize own work and the work of the technical staff
• Ability to contribute to hypothesis generation, experimental design, data analysis and manuscript writing

We also appreciate experience in:

• Organic chemistry (analytical and/or synthesis)
• R scripting (or equivalent) and Unix based bioinformatics tools
• Multi-omics data analysis
• Microbiology
• Immunology

University of Helsinki welcomes applicants from a variety of genders, linguistic and cultural backgrounds, and minorities.

Salary and benefits

The salary is based on the job requirement scheme for teaching and research staff according to the salary system of the Finnish universities. In addition, the appointee will be paid a personal salary component. The monthly salary in a full time postdoctoral researcher position is usually about 3 300–3 600 €) depending on applicant’s qualifications and experience.

Occupational health care is provided for university employees. Read more about the employee benefits at the University of Helsinki: https://www.helsinki.fi/en/about-us/careers .

Interested in the position?

Please submit your application and the required attachments through the University of Helsinki Recruitment System.

The application (in Finnish or in English) should include:

• a motivation letter (max 1 page) with research interests / plans
• a detailed CV (with the date of thesis defense and date of PhD graduation, title of the thesis, previous academic/work positions, current position, academic distinctions and list of peer-reviewed publications), motivation letter (1 page), three reference contacts, and other possible documents attesting to your competence for the position.
• copy/copies of the diploma(s) of previous degree(s)

The closing date for applications is August the 31th 2022 (23:59 EEST).

Further information