PhD position - Genetic and spatial biology of viruses in plant-feeding nematodes

at  Wageningen University Research

DO YOU HAVE A KEEN INTEREST IN INTERACTIONS BETWEEN HOSTS AND PARASITES? WOULD YOU ENJOY TO PURSUE PHD IN MOLECULAR BIOLOGY? ARE YOU ENTHUSIASTIC ABOUT COMBINING EXPERIMENTAL LABWORK AND NEXT GENERATION SEQUENCING ANALYSES? IF YES, THEN WE MAY HAVE THE PERFECT OPPORTUNITY FOR YOU!

The Laboratory of Nematology at Wageningen University & Research is seeking a motivated and curiosity-driven PhD candidate to join an interdisciplinary and collaborative team aimed at unraveling the biology of viruses of plant-parasitic nematodes. Plant-parasitic nematodes cause severe agricultural damage and only recently the first viruses infecting them have been discovered, presenting new research opportunities to understand and halt these pest species.
As a PhD candidate in this project you will perform and analyze experiments that contain a combination microbiology, molecular biology and next-generation sequencing techniques (e.g. RNA- and Tomo-seq). Specifically, you will localize different viruses in two important plant-parasitic nematode species, map nematode genes involved in infection and may discover viral genes involved in immune suppression. Thereby, you will contribute fundamental understanding of the genetic and spatial interactions between plant-parasitic nematodes and their viruses.

Please refer the Job description for details