Postdoctoral Fellow

 About the team/job

EMBL is Europe’s life sciences laboratory – an intergovernmental organisation with more than 110 independent research groups and service teams covering the spectrum of molecular biology. It operates across six sites in Heidelberg (headquarters), Barcelona, Cambridge, Grenoble, Hamburg and Rome. Our mission is to perform basic research in molecular biology; train scientists, students and visitors at all levels; offer vital services to scientists in the public and private sectors within the member states; develop new instruments and methods; and engage actively in technology transfer.

The group of Arnaud Krebs (EMBL Heidelberg) is looking for 2 post-doctoral candidate (s) (computational and experimental) to develop ERC and DFG funded projects aiming at understanding the molecular mechanisms used by transcription factors at enhancers to activate transcription.

The Krebs group at EMBL studies the mechanisms used by Transcription Factors to interpret the regulatory genetic information. We contributed to the field’s understanding of cooperativity mechanisms (Sönmezer C, et al, 2021), the influence of DNA methylation (Kreibich et al, 2023) and nuclear context on the function of enhancers. Our approach combines development of new genomics strategies such as single molecule footprinting and high-throughput perturbation systems (Krebs A, et al, eLife 2019) to understand how Transcription Factors control cell identity.

Your role

The project entails the development of systematic approaches to study the mechanisms used by transcription factors to cooperate at enhancers and activate transcription. Successful candidates will study if the co-occupancy of specific TF combinations on DNA leads to transcription activation. The approaches include, but not limited to single cell, single molecule genomics, long read sequencing optogenetics, and high-throughput genetic perturbations. The post-doc candidates will profit from the expertise in single molecule genomics (Krebs A, TIGS 2021) and computational biology within the Krebs lab (Kleinendorst R, Barzaghi G et al,). The work will be directly supported by the computational facility and the high-end sequencing facility at EMBL.

You have

A PhD or equivalent qualification in molecular biology or computational biology. You are interested in mechanisms of genome regulation, enthusiastic for large scale quantitative experimental biology. You are excited by biological discoveries, you are interested in interdisciplinary science, and you enjoy collaborative work.

Why join us

EMBL is curiosity-driven, community-oriented and international. As an inclusive, equal opportunity employer, we believe that diversity enables us to collaborate more effectively and be innovative in our approaches. We are, therefore, committed to creating an inclusive and flexible culture - one where everyone can realise their full potential and make a positive contribution to our organisation. 

We encourage applications from individuals who can complement our existing team – we believe that success is built on having teams whose backgrounds and personal experiences reflect the diversity of the populations that our science serves. We actively encourage applications from all genders and cultures, ethnic groups and all demographics to help us avoid perpetuating biases and oversights at this transformational point in our people strategy.

EMBL offers attractive conditions and benefits appropriate to an international research organisation with a very collegial and family-friendly working environment. Competitive salary and social security benefits, financial support for relocation, a relaxed culture, professional development, an on-site nursery, canteen and other staff facilities make EMBL a great place to work.

** Don’t meet every single requirement? We are dedicated to building a diverse, inclusive and authentic workplace, so if you’re excited about this role but your past experience doesn’t align perfectly with every qualification in the job description, we encourage you to apply nevertheless.

What else you need to know

We are Europe’s research laboratory for the life sciences – an intergovernmental organisation performing scientific research in disciplines including molecular biology, physics, chemistry and computer science. We are an international, innovative and interdisciplinary laboratory with more than 1900 employees from many nations, operating across six sites, in Heidelberg (HQ), Barcelona, Hinxton near Cambridge, Hamburg, Grenoble and Rome.

Our mission is to offer vital services in training scientists, students and visitors at all levels; to develop new instruments and methods in the life sciences and actively engage in technology transfer activities, and to integrate European life science research. The working language of the institute is English.

In your online application, you will be asked to include a cover letter and a CV.

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