[CEPCEB_All] USDA ORISE Postdoc Position in Oxford, MS

[Meng Chen]

USDA-ARS Molecular Biology Postdoctoral Fellowship in the Natural Products Utilization Research Unit

https://www.zintellect.com/Opportunity/Details/USDA-ARS-SEA-2026-0280

Organization U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA)

Reference Code USDA-ARS-SEA-2026-0280

Application Deadline 9/11/2026 3:00:00 PM Eastern Time Zone

Description
*Applications are reviewed on a rolling-basis.

ARS Office/Lab and Location: A research opportunity is currently available with the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), Agricultural Research Service (ARS), Natural Products Utilization Research Unit located in Oxford, Mississippi.

The Agricultural Research Service (ARS) is the U.S. Department of Agriculture's chief scientific in-house research agency with a mission to find solutions to agricultural problems that affect Americans every day from field to table. ARS will deliver cutting-edge, scientific tools and innovative solutions for American farmers, producers, industry, and communities to support the nourishment and well-being of all people; sustain our nation’s agroecosystems and natural resources; and ensure the economic competitiveness and excellence of our agriculture. The vision of the agency is to provide global leadership in agricultural discoveries through scientific excellence.

Research Project: The Natural Products Utilization Research Unit develops natural products for use in agriculture, producing more toxicologically and environmentally benign pest management tools and improving the value of crops. A secondary mission is to conduct fundamental research to aid in the development of alternative crops to produce pharmaceuticals and botanical supplement active ingredients. This fellowship aims to improve crop protection from pests through the use of natural products, either by discovering safer natural pesticides or by manipulating their production in plants by genetic engineering or other means.  You will use plant molecular biology to discover genes involved in the biosynthesis, transport, and metabolism of natural products with an emphasis on weed management and allelopathic interactions.  

These directives require a multifaceted approach involving physiological, biochemical, and molecular experiments and the use of numerous techniques such as RNA-seq, data mining of DNA and protein sequence databases, analysis of gene function via CRISPR/Cas-9-mediated genome editing and RNAi, heterologous protein expression, real-time qRT-PCR, and plant transformation using species such as Arabidopsis, rice, tobacco, sorghum, corn and wheat.  The information generated will, for example, dramatically increase current understanding of the biosynthesis and genetic regulation of allelochemicals and provide the tools necessary to manipulate these pathways in planta via genetic engineering.  

-- 
Meng Chen
Professor of Cell Biology
Department of Botany & Plant Sciences
University of California, Riverside 
Website: http://www.plasticgenome.org/

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