Sandia National Laboratories is the nation's premier science and engineering lab for national security and technology innovation with major facilities in Albuquerque, New Mexico and Livermore, California. We are a world-class team of scientists, engineers, technologists, post docs, and visiting researchers all focused on cutting-edge technology, ranging from homeland defense, global security, biotechnology, and environmental preservation to energy and combustion research, computer security, and nuclear defense. To learn more, please visit our website at www.sandia.gov.
Sandia National Laboratories is searching for a Computational Biologist to join the Biomass Science and Conversion Technology Department located in sunny Emeryville, California. This is a temporary opportunity, working a full-time schedule.
Department Description
The Biomass Science and Conversion Technology Department, located in Livermore, California, performs biological and bioengineering research with applications in advanced biofuels, renewable energy, nanobiology, nanotoxicology, and biofuels. The Biomass Science and Conversion Technology Department at Sandia National Laboratories also plays an essential role in the recently funded DOE Joint BioEnergy Institute (JBEI), one of three Bioenergy Research Centers in the Nation. JBEI is a new multi-organizational research center comprising world-class resources and expertise located in one facility at Emeryville, California. The goal of JBEI is to use rapidly advancing scientific techniques, such as systems and synthetic biology, to accelerate development of the nation's biofuels industry.
Primary Job Duties
We are seeking a Computational Biologist to join a team of researchers investigating the optimization of biofuels production from renewable lignocellulosic biomass. The research team is comprised of biochemical engineers, biologists, chemical engineers, computational scientists, biophysicists and chemists. This position will be hired into the Enzyme Engineering team of the Deconstruction Division at the Joint BioEnergy Institute. Our team is investigating the enzymatic conversion of biomass components (cellulose, hemicellulose and lignin) to their simpler components (e.g., monosaccharides and monolignols) within the overall research projects to enhance the production of biofuels from a variety of cellulosic biomass. The multidisciplinary team is using a combination of enzyme engineering, biochemical and biophysical characterization, structural and computational biology, high-throughput screening and genomic and proteomic discovery to identify enzyme targets for modification and iterative improvement of their stability, activity and tolerance to targeted biomass pretreatment protocols. The postdoctoral associate in this position will be tasked with using computational biology to understand how protein structure and dynamics are altered under biomass pretreatment conditions, how these changes correlate with changes in enzyme activity and predicting changes to the protein structure that will enhance enzyme stability in various pretreatment environments. In addition, the postdoctoral researcher will develop algorithms and classification schemes for predicting the likelihood an enzyme will be stable and active in the pretreatment environment using features extracted from protein sequences and structures.
Post Doc Hiring Program
The Post-Doctoral Appointee Program is designed to recruit outstanding Ph.D. applicants to assist a line organization in meeting its mission objectives and to provide a professional technical work environment for the employee. The Ph.D. must have been conferred within one to five years prior to employment. These assignments are for a one-year period, with the option at management’s discretion to serve no more than five additional one-year assignments.
Required
• A PhD and expertise in both computational biology/chemistry and bioinformatics.
• Strong track record in using computational biology/chemistry and bioinformatics to understand the relationships among protein sequence, structure, dynamics, stability and function.
• Strong publication record.
• Good communication skills and ability to work with multi-disciplinary teams.
Desired
• Research experience in enzyme engineering using rational design approaches.
• Background in lignocellulolytic enzymes used in biofuels.
• Expertise in design of experiments for optimizing synergistic enzyme mixtures.
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