Research Assistant

The Department of Biology is looking for a Research Assistant to join the Poole group to work on a project funded by BBSRC.

With the human population estimated to reach 9.8 billion people by 2050, the looming nitrogen (N) crisis, stemming from the intensive use of fertilisers in agriculture, requires urgent global action. Massive synthesis and application of fertiliser N has a large energy cost, causes CO2 release and results in large-scale loss of reduced N to the environment. Use of legumes, which in association with rhizobia can fix up to 200 kg N per ha, as crops and for forage are potential ways to improve both N efficiency and the sustainability of agriculture. We are therefore studying the lifecycle of rhizobia from the rhizosphere to its role as a nitrogen fixing endosymbiont in legume root nodules. This involves complex changes in its cells wall and outer membrane.

In this project the successful applicant will investigate the biochemistry and genetics of these changes and the specific role of LDT-transaminases in remodelling peptidoglycan. This will involve cloning and mutating the LDT-transaminases and investigating their impact on the growth and nitrogen fixation properties of the bacteria inoculated onto legumes.

Where Covid-19 has resulted in substantial disruption to your work or research outputs, please explain this by providing an additional paragraph in your supporting statement.

The University of Oxford is committed to equality and valuing diversity. All applicants will be judged on merit, according to the selection criteria.

This post is full time and available immediately for till 31 March 2026.

The closing date for applications is 12.00 noon (GMT +1) on Wednesday 25th October, interviews are likely to be scheduled for early November.

Applications for this vacancy are to be made online via our e-recruitment system, and you will be required to upload a supporting statement and CV as part of your online application.

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