Deadline extended to March 31st 2014 The Royal Belgian Museum for Natural Sciences is looking for a: Post doctoral researcher April 2014 – February 2018 Summary : The successful candidate will work in the framework of a 4 year project financed by the Belgian science policy, Belspo. Belspo Brain project: “Behavioral and genomic aspects of cichlid speciation; GENBAS – GENetic Basis for Speciation”. The proposal’s two main objectives are to characterize the genomic differentiation that drives the speciation process, and to verify whether/and to what extent the same genomic changes are involved in to maintain the ‘integrity’ of the gene pools of the resulting sister species. We intend to address this question through a dual approach: one that compares the genome wide differentiation within and between sister species, and one that explores the genetic basis of the behavioural aspects (display and acoustic signalling during courtship) that allow female fishes to differentiate between con-specific and hetero-specific males. For this purpose, we have selected the Lake Tanganyika cichlid genus Ophthalmotilapia. More specifically, our experimental design involves the combination of four studies: (1) to explore behavioural and acoustic aspects of mate pairing during con- and hetero-specific interactions among species; (2) to investigate differential gene expression in the female brain associated with pairing behaviour during con- and hetero-specific interactions; (3) to elucidate genetic differences within and among relatively recently diverged and hybridizing species at a genome-wide level; and (4) to examine whether the part of the genome that is expressed during mate recognition in the brains of the female cichlids correspond with one or more of the genomic areas with increased differentiation within or among these species. The project is a collaboration between Erik Verheyen (RBINS), Jos Snoeks (RMCA), Jeroen Van Houdt (KULeuven), Eric Parmentier & Pascal Poncin (ULiège). Tasks : - Coordination of the project: organisation of meetings, coordinate the different studies of the project partners, reporting, keeping time lines - Implementation of Next Generation Sequencing (NGS) methods: Genotyping by Sequencing, RNA sequencing - Data-analysis NGS data, Integration of behavioral and accoustic data with genomic results - Supervision and co-operation with partner researchers, students - Publication of results Profile : Education : PhD in sciences: Biology, Biotechnology, Genomics Experience : 3-10 years of experience in independent research, experience in genetic/genomic research Technical competences : Experienced in molecular genetics: (Sanger & NGS) sequencing, microsatellites Experienced in NGS methods and NGS data analysis Experienced with population genetics and phylogeographic methods Languages: Dutch and/or French, English Generic competences : Independent, people management, project management, coordination, co-operation, good interpersonal skills, prepared to travel if required Extra : Project coordination Programming skills (perl, python, R, …) Experience working with fish experiments Offer: Full time position (maximum 4 years) Remuneration according to education and experience Free public transport (in Belgium) between your place of residence and the Institute Application Send (in a single pdf file) an application letter and your CV with contact information of two references before March 31st 2014 to: [email protected]
Posted on: Wed, 19 Mar 2014 10:26:00 +0000