Research Assistant

We are seeking a Research Assistant to join the Riglar Lab (www.riglarlab.com) on an exciting ‘breakthrough ideas’ project focussed on Microbiome Engineering.

Engineered bacterial communities promise to one day offer solutions to a range of global health, agriculture, and environmental challenges. This project strives to improve the efficacy, safety, and reliability of this frontier technology by developing tools to tune community growth and behaviour after deployment to a target environment. To do this, we will genetically engineer bacteria using synthetic biology approaches and study the effects on bacterial community behaviour.

You will join an inclusive research team with a focus on both scientific achievement and personal growth (www.riglarlab.com/our-philosophy) in the Section for Structural and Synthetic Biology within the Department of Infectious Disease at Imperial College London’s South Kensington Campus. Our group broadly undertakes interdisciplinary research seeking to understand the dynamics of host-microbiome interactions during disease. We are also affiliated with the Imperial College Centre for Synthetic Biology and Innovation and The Francis Crick Institute.

Duties and responsibilities

You will undertake research to control engineered bacterial growth and understand the impact on microbial communities. This will include assisting in research planning and data analysis to engineer bacteria with synthetic DNA-based circuits and test their growth in communities using in vitro bacterial co-culture methods. You will also contribute to the strong research environment and culture of our group.

Essential requirements

• A Masters degree (or equivalent) in Synthetic Biology, Microbiology, Molecular Biology, or other related field


• Experience of bacterial genetic engineering, DNA cloning, and/or synthetic biology techniques


• Experience of basic microbiology techniques, ideally co-culture


• Ability to develop and apply new concepts


• Willingness to work as part of a team

Further information

This is a Full Time and Fixed Term post for up to 9 months or Part Time (0.80FTE) for 1 year.

Should you require any further details on the role please contact: Dr David Riglar – d.riglar@imperial.ac.uk

The College is a proud signatory to the San-Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment (DORA), which means that in hiring and promotion decisions, we evaluate applicants on the quality of their work, not the journal impact factor where it is published. For more information, see https://www.imperial.ac.uk/research-and-innovation/about-imperial-research/research-evaluation/

The College believes that the use of animals in research is vital to improve human and animal health and welfare. Animals may only be used in research programmes where their use is shown to be necessary for developing new treatments and making medical advances. Imperial is committed to ensuring that, in cases where this research is deemed essential, all animals in the College’s care are treated with full respect, and that all staff involved with this work show due consideration at every level.http://www.imperial.ac.uk/research-and-innovation/about-imperial-research/research-integrity/animal-research/

• Job Description - Research Assistant - RS.pdf