Research Fellow

Closing date: 25/11/2022, 5pm

Full-time: 35 hours per week

Fixed term: 48 months

We are looking for a postdoctoral research fellow to fill a 4-year position within the Genome Biology Division at the Roslin Institute working as part of the Centre for Tropical Livestock Genetics and Health. The role of the post-holder of this 4-year vacancy will be to use multi-omics and ecological niche modelling approaches to investigate resilience of indigenous African chickens to environmental stress. The post holder must have a PhD or PhD near completion in a relevant subject (bioinformatics, genomics, genetics or similar).

The Opportunity:

Unlike productivity traits, knowledge regarding the genetic architecture of climate resilience and environmental adaptation traits is still limited. Whether such traits are regulated by a few major-effect genes or many genes with small effects, or a combination of the two, needs to be established (Perini et al. 2021; Porto-Neto et al. 2014). Also unknown is the effect of different types of genetic variants (such as large structural variants) and the extent of epigenetic regulation in environmental adaptation. Understanding these aspects will have an important bearing on what breeding approach should be adopted to enhance the resilience performance of poultry (e.g. Marker-assisted selection when a few major-effect genes are involved; genomic selection for many genes with small effect; gene-editing for directly introgressing beneficial causative variants; thermal treatment of embryos if epigenetic regulation plays a major role in thermo-tolerance, or directly selecting for beneficial epigenetic signatures for breeding improvement).

By combining genomics with Ecological Modelling (EM) and landscape genomics, our previous work has provided important insights and generated valuable resources towards understanding adaptation in response to various environmental stressors encountered by African indigenous chickens (Gheyas et al. 2021; Vallejo-Trujillo et al. 2022). Specifically, analysis of sequence data from Ethiopian and Nigerian indigenous chickens led to the identification of candidate regions and genes associated with important adaptation traits, including heat stress, drought, a scavenging diet and high-altitude stresses (hypoxia, thrombosis, and cold temperature).

In this project, the post-holder will (i) validate the effect of previously identified and novel candidate loci, genes, and markers, (ii) establish their phenotypic association, (iii) enhance the understanding of the genetic architecture of resilience traits by working on other variants (e.g. CNVs) and epigenetic regulations, (iv) deliver a set of resources (candidate genes/epigenetic loci or causative variants), and (vii) develop breeding pathways to deliver enhanced environmental stress resilience to African poultry. This will strengthen collaborations with National Breeding Programs (Kenya – KALRO, Ethiopia – EIAR/ARARI, Tanzania – TALIRI, Nigeria, Ghana, and Zimbabwe) for an effective delivery of improved environmentally-resilient chicken genotypes for the benefit of small-holder farmers.

Your skills and attributes for success:

• Be skilled in genomic/transcriptomic/epigenetic analyses (WGS variant analysis/RNAseq/WGBS) and ecological niche modelling approaches
• Be comfortable working with large datasets within a linux environment.
• Have some knowledge of poultry genetics/chicken biology
• Be experienced in writing/preparing scientific publications.
• Have the ability to work individually and as part of a larger team to meet specified deadlines.