The Max Planck Institute for Plant Breeding Research (MPIPZ) in Cologne invites applications for a Postdoctoral Position. The position is available from February 1st, 2016 for 2 years.
About the organization: The primary scientific goal of the Department of Plant Developmental Biology (Director: George Coupland) is to study molecular mechanisms that regulate the responsiveness of plant development to environmental cues. In particular, a strong emphasis is placed on understanding the mechanisms controlling the transition to flowering in response to environmental signals and in explaining the diversity in flowering responses observed between species.
These studies employ molecular-genetic, biochemical and cell biology-based approaches in the model species Arabidopsis thaliana to investigate the roles of key regulatory proteins in flowering.
Project description: The research group of Prof. Dr. Klaus Theres investigates molecular mechanisms that control axillary meristem (AM) formation, the initial step in shoot branching. In tomato and Arabidopsis, several transcription factors (TFs) were characterized that regulate AM formation.
The aim of the proposed project is to investigate how these TFs exert their function and how they communicate with each other. Recent work of the group is summarized in Wang et al. (2015) New Phytologist, doi: 10.1111/nph.13641.
Requirements: PhD in molecular biology with a strong background in plant work. Experience in some or all of the following disciplines is desirable:
- plant development,
- genetics, histology,
- molecular biology, and
- transcriptomics.
Salary: The salary will be according to the German TVöD. The Max Planck Society is committed to employing more handicapped individuals and especially encourages them to apply. The Max Planck Society also seeks to increase the number of women in those areas where they are underrepresented and therefore explicitly encourages women to apply.
Application Procedure: Applications including a letter of motivation, CV, publication list and contact details of at least two academic referees should be sent as a single PDF file via e-mail to Klaus Theres (theres@mpipz.mpg.de).
Deadline Reviewing of applications will start January 11th, 2016, and be continued until a suitable candidate is found.
Links http://www.mpipz.mpg.de/theres