Postdoctoral Researcher

Organisation/Company John Innes Centre Department Crop Genetics Research Field Biological sciences » Biology Researcher Profile First Stage Researcher (R1) Positions PhD Positions Final date to receive applications 26 Oct 2026 - 23:59 (Europe/London) Country United Kingdom Type of Contract Temporary Job Status Full-time Hours Per Week 37 Is the job funded through the EU Research Framework Programme? Not funded by a EU programme Is the Job related to staff position within a Research Infrastructure?

No

An exciting opportunity has arisen for a Postdoctoral Researcher to join the Wilkinson Group at the John Innes Centre, working in collaboration with the Hutchings lab, on a project titled:
Global activation of silent and cryptic biosynthetic pathways in Streptomyces species.

About the John Innes Centre:

The John Innes Centre is an independent, international centre of excellence in plant and microbial sciences. We nurture a creative, curiosity-led approach to answering fundamental questions in bioscience, and translate that knowledge into societal benefits.

Our strategic vision, Healthy Plants, Healthy People, Healthy Planet, sets out our ambitious long-term goals for the game changing impact of our science globally.

We are an inter-disciplinary team that includes chemists, biochemists and micro/molecular biologists who work on the discovery, biosynthesis, and biosynthetic engineering of microbial specialised metabolites, and on understanding the role these metabolites play in the environment. We focus on anti-infective molecules and additionally study their molecular targets & mechanisms of action, and the immunity mechanisms employed by their producer organisms.

Project background:

Streptomyces specialised metabolites form the basis of two thirds of clinically used antibiotics but only 3% of the specialised metabolite pathways encoded in their genomes have been matched to molecules. The majority are “silent” which means they can be identified in genome sequences, but they are not expressed under standard laboratory growth conditions. Streptomyces bacteria have also been found to contain “cryptic” biosynthetic gene clusters (BGCs) which cannot be predicted by similarity search-based tools such as antiSMASH and likely encode new molecules.

Regulation of silent and cryptic gene clusters is complex and multilevel, and this makes it extremely challenging to understand.

The project:

We are taking a high-level approach to activate multiple silent and cryptic gene clusters in Streptomyces bacteria through the manipulation of global regulators that are highly conserved. The project will focus on a family of highly conserved transcription factors which appear to be at or near the top of a hierarchy of regulators that coordinate the lifecycle of Streptomyces with specialised metabolism:
our preliminary data show that manipulation of these TFs actives the expression of multiple silent and cryptic BGCs in Streptomyces venezuelae, leading to the production of new molecules.

The role:

The successful candidate will isolate and structurally characterise new specialised metabolites produced by a panel of engineered Streptomyces strains and link them to BGCs. Building on these data you will delineate the biosynthesis of the new molecules and investigate their bioactivity in a range of biochemical and cellular assays.

The ideal candidate:

You will have a PhD in Natural Products Chemistry with in-depth knowledge of natural product isolation and structure elucidation, especially when working with small quantities of material, and of metabolomics and molecular networking.

You will have a proven ability to perform research and develop novel ideas in natural products chemistry and discovery. Experience in…