Post Master’s RA – Algal Biology

Microalgal Crop Protection Researcher

The Functional and Systems Group within the Environmental Molecular Sciences Division at PNNL seeks a versatile researcher to lead work on microalgal crop protection and strain improvement using modern molecular and chemical biology techniques, including adaptive laboratory evolution (ALE). The successful candidate will:

• Identify and characterize microalgal pests, including chytrids and other fungal parasites, oomycetes, amoebae, rotifers, ciliates, algicidal bacteria, and viruses, that threaten productivity and crop stability in large-scale cultivation, using microscopy, flow cytometry, culture-based isolation, and molecular diagnostics including DNA/RNA extraction, PCR, qPCR, amplicon and metagenomic sequencing workflows.
• Characterize host–pest interactions at the cellular and molecular level (attachment, infection dynamics, grazing pressure, host response) through controlled co-culture challenge assays, and establish early-detection and monitoring strategies that support pond crop protection decisions.
• Advance strain productivity and lipid improvement by investigating genetic and phenotypic mechanisms underlying tolerance to light, oxygen, salinity, temperature, and nutrient limitation, and by uncovering genetic modifications that enhance lipid and high-value bioproduct accumulation for biofuels and bioproducts applications.
• Analyze data using molecular biology, biochemistry, analytical chemistry, and bioinformatics to link phenotypic and genetic changes to pest resistance, stress tolerance, and productivity; generate datasets supporting systems biology efforts such as genome-scale metabolic models (GEMs) of biomass and bioproduct formation.
• Communicate and collaborate with interdisciplinary and multi-institutional teams (microbiologists, engineers, computational biologists, environmental scientists); contribute to publications, technical reports, and presentations; work and maintain strict laboratory safety, biosafety, and regulatory compliance.

** Position is onsite only, and located in Richland, WA.**

Minimum Qualifications:

• Candidates must have received a Master's degree within the past 24 months or within the next 8 months from an accredited college or university.

Preferred Qualifications:

• MS degree in microbiology, marine biology, chemical engineering, molecular biology or a related field.
• Experience with culture health monitoring, contamination and pest detection, and microbial community characterization: sterile and anaerobic technique, light microscopy, flow cytometry, qPCR, ddPCR, and 16S rRNA sequencing workflows.
• Familiarity with interpreting mixed-community sequence data through sequence alignment, BLAST, taxonomic and phylogenetic analysis, and biological database searching (NCBI, Uni Prot) to identify and track pest organisms.
• Experience designing and executing ALE and phenotypic optimization experiments targeting stress tolerance, nutrient efficiency, and lipid or pigment yields.
• Proficiency cultivating microbial and algal strains, including fastidious and extremophilic strains, in photobioreactors and outdoor cultivation systems, including biomass harvesting and processing and scale-up.
• Familiarity with high-throughput screening/phenotyping and statistical methods for tracking phenotypic and fitness changes across generations.
• Core molecular biology skills (Gibson assembly, PCR, DNA/RNA extraction and quantification, algal and bacterial transformation, electroporation, mutagenesis, primer/plasmid design, nucleic acid QC) and analytical instrumentation experience (HPLC/UPLC, GC, mass spectrometry, UV-vis, flow cytometry, microscopy) for lipid, pigment, and biomass analysis.
• Genomic and computational skills: whole-genome sequencing, transcriptomics, comparative genomics, genome/gene annotation, and scripting in Python or R in a Linux/command-line environment.
• The successful candidate will interact with other staff and participate in team-based collaborative research within PNNL as well as with external organizations. Therefore, strong written, oral and inter-personal communication skills are essential to independently carry out initial analysis of experimental data, and present summaries to project managers and staff.
• Demonstrated expertise in algal biology, strain development, including experience with molecular biology tools and adaptive laboratory evolution and directed evolution.