Evolution of animal cell type programs – PhD position

The Institute

The Centre for Genomic Regulation (CRG) is an international biomedical research institute of excellence, based in Barcelona, Spain, with more than 400 scientists from 44 countries. The CRG is composed by an interdisciplinary, motivated and creative scientific team which is supported both by a flexible and efficient administration and by high-end and innovative technologies.

In April 2021, the Centre for Genomic Regulation (CRG) received the renewal of the 'HR Excellence in Research ' Award from the European Commission. This is a recognition of the Institute's commitment to developing an HR Strategy for Researchers, designed to bring the practices and procedures in line with the principles of the European Charter for Researchers and the Code of Conduct for the Recruitment of Researchers (Charter and Code).

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The role

We are seeking a highly motivated candidate to join our team to work on an interdisciplinary project (experimental and computational) involving single-cell genomics and chromatin profiling in different systems. The research program for this position focuses on elucidating the origin and early evolution of animal genome regulation and cell type diversity (neurons, muscles, secretory cells, etc). To this end, you will apply advanced functional genomics to characterize cell types and regulatory genome features in diverse non-bilaterian metazoan species (Porifera, Ctenophora, Placozoa and Cnidaria). Specifically, this involves: (i) scRNA-seq to define cell type-specific gene expression, (ii) scATAC-seq to investigate cell-specific cis-regulatory element usage, and (iii) SELEX-seq to interrogate transcription factor binding affinities and infer cell type gene regulatory networks. You will also participate in the analysis, integration, and interpretation of these omics datasets.

This is a strongly collaborative project and, as such, it will involve visits to laboratories in different countries, particularly to sample different organisms. Our laboratory has advanced single-cell infrastructure and you will be trained and regularly use a droplet-based single-cell platform, as well as liquid-handling robots. Previous experience in basic molecular biology procedures is an advantage. Creativity and intellectual independence are desirable, as is the ability to work collaboratively.

About the group

The Sebe-Pedros Group (https://www.sebepedroslab.org/ ) studies genome regulation from an evolutionary systems perspective. In particular, we are interested in deciphering the evolutionary dynamics of animal cell type gene regulatory networks and in reconstructing the evolution of genome regulatory mechanisms (from transcription factor binding through chromatin states to the physical architecture of the genome). To this end, we combine phylogenetic tools with functional genomics and proteomics methods (chromatin profiling, single-cell genomics) in order to characterize and compare cell types and epigenomic landscapes in non-model animal and other eukaryotic species.