PhD position at Umeå Plant Science Centre

Umeå University - with its 33,000 students and over 4,000 employees - is an organisation in constant change and development.Umeå University conducts groundbreaking research within several areas - several in which we are among the best in the world - within others regarded as the leaders in Sweden.We are one of Sweden's largest providers of education and offer a broad and attractive range of courses and programmes.Our campus constitutes an inspiring environment for everyone that studies and works here.We wish to co-operate with companies and organisations throughout the Umeå region and all over the world.PhD position at Umeå Plant Science Centre in the Bioimprove programme (4 years) Project title Improving biomass production in trees -modification of the wood density Project description The aim of this PhD project is to improve biomass accumulation in the stem by controlling the lifetime of the individual xylem elements.The idea is to prolong the lifetime of the xylem elements in order to prolong the phase of wood cell wall deposition, which is then expected to result in increased wood density and therefore also increased biomass accumulation in the stem.In this project, cell death is modified in transgenic Populus trees by modifying expression pattern of a recently identified protein which regulates the interplay between lignification and cell death.The function of this protein is also further characterised in the herbaceous woody model system Arabidopsis thaliana by using state-of-the-art techniques in molecular biology, genetics, biochemistry, cell wall analytics and microscopy.The project is part of a FORMAS funded research programme BioImprove (www.bioimprove.se), which is launched in the beginning of the year 2010.Nine PhD students will be hired within the programme.The PhD position is placed at the department of Plant Physiology, which is part of Umeå Plant Science Centre (www.upsc.se).UPSC is a leading research institute in experimental plant biology with a friendly and international atmosphere.PhD training will be provided within the Bioimprove programme and the graduate training of UPSC and the KBC centre of Umeå University (www.kbc.umu.se).Applicants must have completed a research degree (e.g., Master's) or university study of 240 hp (4 years) in molecular biology, biochemistry, chemistry or equivalent.Previous experience in molecular biology, plant biology, microscopy techniques and/or spectroscopic tools is an advantage.Good social skills, ability to work independently as well as in collaboration with others and good skills in English language are valued.Evaluations will be based on the results of the university courses, quality of the Master's thesis, personal references, interviews and the letter of intent.Questions or inquires about the position can be answered by Hannele Tuominen, tel.Applications will be discarded or, if the applicant so wishes, returned two years after the position has been filled.Documents sent electronically should be in MS Word or PDF format.