PhD thesis in the field of microbial natural product research

Job Offer from September 07, 2023

The AG Bode (Department of Natural Products in Organismic Interactions) at the Max-Planck-Institute for Terrestrial Microbiology looks for a motivated PhD student (m/f/d) who wants to do a PhD thesis in the field of natural product research.

We are seeking for a PhD student with a good background in chemistry (synthetic organic chemistry and/or analytical chemistry, biochemistry) interested in

• the identification of microbial natural products in lab cultures but also on agar plates or leaf surfaces using MALDI Imaging Mass Spectrometry
• manipulation of the analyzed bacteria using synthetic biology methods (promoter exchange approaches, genome editing) in order to produce the identified natural products in larger quantities
• isolation and structure elucidation of the desired natural products (based on mass spectrometry and/or NMR) for functional analysis

We are working mainly with bacteria of the genera Xenorhabdus and Photorhabdus, which are entomopathogenic (insect-pathogen) and have a fascinating life cycle including symbiosis and virulence but have recently also moved to other proteobacteria.

The aim of the thesis is to investigate the natural products in time and space ideally in the most natural environment. The candidate will mainly use different analytical and preparative HPLC/MS and MALDI-MS techniques, as well as molecular biology methods, all well-established and directly accessible in the group.

The Max Planck Society is committed to increasing the number of individuals with disabilities in its workforce and therefore encourages applications from such qualified individuals.

Furthermore, the Max Planck Society seeks to increase the number of women in those areas where they are underrepresented and therefore explicitly encourages women to apply.

If you are interested and/or want to know more about the project, please contact me:

[email protected]

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We look forward to your application!