CDC Molecular Biology Training - Malaria and Parasitic Diseases Laboratory

Organization

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)

CDC-

10/9/2026 3:00:00 PM Eastern Time Zone

Applications will be reviewed on a rolling-basis.

A research opportunity is available in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), located in Atlanta, Georgia.

The training location will be the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC) Roybal campus in Atlanta, Georgia. You may also be trained in other laboratories in CDC as well as academic institutions within the US and overseas. This opportunity may involve both domestic and overseas travel.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is one of the major operation components of the Department of Health and Human Services. CDC protects America from health, safety and security threats, both foreign and in the U.S. Whether diseases start at home or abroad, are chronic or acute, curable or preventable, human error or deliberate attack, CDC fights disease and supports communities and citizens to do the same.

CDC increases the health security of our nation. As the nation’s health protection agency, CDC saves lives and protects people from health threats. To accomplish its mission, CDC conducts important science and provides health information that protects our nation against expensive and dangerous health threats, and responds when these arise.

The Malaria laboratory supports malaria research and surveillance as well as control and prevention activities in the US and overseas. In addition, the laboratory is ramping up laboratory support for Chagas and Babesiosis surveillance. Activities include diagnostics to improve detection, surveillance for anti-malaria drug resistance and outbreak support. The Division collaborates with several disease programs within CDC, state public health laboratories and academic and research institutions within the US and overseas.

The laboratory’s goal is to develop molecular biology techniques and implement them in testing assays for malaria and other parasitic diseases such as Babesiosis and Chagas disease. A major part of the project involves next generation sequencing (NGS) including use of the Oxford Nanopore Technology (ONT) and the Illumina Next Seq 1000/2000 platforms for malaria genomic testing.

• Training focus 1:
  Operationalize laboratory assay platforms
  - You will gain experience in ordering reagents and laboratory supplies, tracking inventory, and learning laboratory resource management practices. You will gain experience from safety points of contact in drafting CDC-compliant biological and chemical risk assessment forms relevant to laboratory assays. You will also learn to develop laboratory protocols and supporting documents based on published literature and other scientific information sources.
• Training focus 2:
  Operationalize the ONT analysis pipeline
  - You will learn to conduct testing and follow-up analyses using the ONT sequencing output, organize accurate tracking of ONT sequencing outputs, metadata, and results, and draft CDC-compliant analysis protocols and supporting documents based on published literature for utilizing the sequenced results.
• Training focus 3:
  Train on molecular testing using Illumina Next Seq 1000/2000, or other platforms
  - You will learn to test and analyze malaria parasite genomic sequences in support of Malaria Molecular Surveillance (MMS) and genotyping for diagnostic resistance markers using these platforms and to identify potential new markers of anti-malarial drug resistance.
• Training focus 4:
  Evaluate and validate the laboratory assays – You will gain experience on the optimization and adaptation of the NGS assays as needed by learning to design experiments to describe the assay performance including development of validation plans, conducting proposed experiments, analyzing results, and development of a validation report.
• Training focus 5:
  Development or adoption of established methods to test for Babesia, Chagas disease and malaria
  - You will receive training in using laboratory tests to support epidemiological investigations for…