Carnegie postdoc fellow position to study mechanisms of thermoadaptation of an extremophile C4 plant

A Carnegie postdoctoral fellow position is available in the Department of Plant Biology at the Carnegie Institution for Science. The fellow will be co-supervised by Sue Rhee (a leader in computational/systems biology) and Joe Berry (a leader in ecophysiology and planetary-scale carbon cycling) in the Department of Global Ecology and will participate in a new collaborative project on mechanisms of themoadaptation and thermotolerance. The focus of the project is Arizona honeysweet (Tidestromia oblongifolia), a desert extremophile C₄ plant that exhibits optimum photosynthetic performance close to 50°C. The overall aim of the project is to combine ecophysiology, metabolic network and biochemical modeling, genomics, proteomics, cell biological and biophysical analysis to decipher the mechanisms underlying this thermotolerance.

We are looking for a talented scientist to join our team and spearhead the molecular, biophysical, and anatomical characterizations of the plant. Responsibilities will include performing transcriptomics, proteomics and metabolomics experiments and characterizing anatomical, cell biological, and biophysical features of the leaf at multiple scales. The directors of our proteomics and advanced imaging facilities will train the successful candidate. The successful candidate will also learn to measure physiological attributes of photosynthesis and transpiration under the guidance of Joe Berry and collaborate with other team members with expertise in biochemical and metabolic network modeling to synthesize mechanistic models of thermoadaptation and thermotolerance.