Call for applications for a fully financed PhD fellowship
The Bioanalytical Unit at the Department for Forensic Medicine, Aarhus University offers a PhD position in GPCR based detection of illicit drugs.
The position is fully funded by the Victim’s Foundation (Offerfonden) and the Department of Forensic Medicine and headed by PI Steffen Sinning (https://pure.au.dk/portal/en/persons/stsi@forens.au.dk).
The project aims at designing, establishing, evaluating and validating functional G protein coupled receptor (GPCR) assays for illicit drugs. The project seeks to develop sensitive receptor-based assays to detect potent opioids and potentially also psychedelics in low concentrations to eventually be used in forensic chemistry evaluations of drug seizures and forensic samples. The project will use primarily opioid and secondarily monoaminergic receptors for detection of illicit drugs in material related to forensic medicine/forensic chemistry and seek to apply these methods in both basic research and for use in forensic toxicology assessments related to commissioned work at the Department of Forensic Medicine.
The successful applicant will become part of an active research group where a curious approach to research and good collaborative skills are highly valued. The applicant is also expected to engage in collaborations and participate in technical supervision of B.Sc and M.Sc students in related projects.
The position is a full-time, 3 year PhD position within the framework at the Graduate School at Faculty of Health, Aarhus University. Ultimately, the position should result in the submission of a PhD thesis and a PhD degree in Medicine from Aarhus University.
Most of the research will be conducted at the Department of Forensic Medicine, Aarhus University (https://forensic.au.dk/), in the research group of Associate Professor Steffen Sinning, which contains 5-8 Masters students, PhD students and postdocs.
The candidate could have a M.Sc. in biochemistry, molecular biology, nanoscience, pharmacology or related fields. The ideal candidate would have experience with functional assays for GPCRs or other membrane proteins in vitro and be familiar with establishing new methods. Insight into pharmacology and molecular pharmacology would be advantageous and experience with methods from cellular biology and molecular biology would be useful for developing and establishing cell-based functional assays.
The position does not require prior knowledge of forensic medicine or forensic chemistry but the applicant should be focused on developing tools that may eventually be useful for drug screening and characterization of new drugs from the illicit drug market.
Please submit your application via this link. Application deadline is 22 November 2024 23:59 CET. Preferred starting date is 1 January 2025.
For information about application requirements and mandatory attachments, please see our application guide.
Please contact Associate Professor Steffen Sinning, stsi@forens.au.dk, for more information.
All interested candidates are encouraged to apply, regardless of their personal background. Salary and terms of employment are in accordance with applicable collective agreement.
