Post Doctoral Scholar

The Ohio State University • Wooster, AR

3d • Onsite

About The Position

Conducts independent research focused on different aspects of soil and plant health, including measurements of soil physicochemical characteristics, microbial diversity and activity, other soil food web components, and plant disease assessments. Specifically, the candidate leads research including experimental design, planning, setup and sampling, data generation and analysis. Experiments could include handling and processing of samples for soil, plant and microbial analyses (including nematodes), maintenance and identification of cultures/isolated populations, and environmental nucleic acid analysis.
The candidate also prepares manuscripts and presentations deriving from interdisciplinary projects on soil health in Ohio cropping systems. The candidate will maintain thorough records of research, including annotated electronic resources and application of statistical analysis and bioinformatic pipelines. The candidate will be expected to contribute to other group activities, such as, but not limited to, training of laboratory personnel, general lab activities and discussions, and extension/outreach.

Requirements

• Handling microbial cultures and molecular expertise (such as DNA/RNA extraction and PCR) and nucleic acid sequence data analysis, including phylogenetics
• Soil and plant health assessments
• Experimental design and statistics
• Bioinformatics as it applies to plant microbiome analysis and familiarity with R language
• Manuscript preparation and publication

Responsibilities

• 50% - Collects, organizes, analyzes, interprets and communicates data (written and oral), including bioinformatic and statistical analysis of soil and plant health and microbiome datasets.
• 40% - Designs and conducts field, greenhouse and laboratory experiments, including characterization of plant and soil health parameters and analysis of soil food web components
• 10% - Advises and interact with graduate and undergraduate students in research activities.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Entry Level
• Education Level: Ph.D. or professional degree