ILRI MSc Graduate Fellowship: Molecular Characterization of Zoonotic Pathogens that Cause Abortion in Livestock in Northern Kenya at International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI)

Key Responsibilities

The MSc fellow to be recruited into the project will:

• Develop an MSc research proposal in line with the requirements of the university of admission.
• Develop a protocol for screening blood, serum samples and tissue samples for a range of potential abortifacients in livestock.
• Process the samples mentioned above for molecular analysis.
• Extract nucleic material from the samples and screen them using standard RT-PCR techniques.
• Process the positive samples detected for genome sequencing to determine the genetic diversity of agents detected.
• Upload all the data obtained from the work to the project database hosted at the ILRI servers.
• Analyze results obtained and draft a thesis and at least one journal publication.

The Ideal Candidate Should

Requirements:

• Have registered in a recognized university and is currently pursuing an MSc in molecular biology, bioinformatics or related field.
• Have completed their course work and is ready to begin the research component of their study.
• Possess working experience in molecular screening techniques including RT PCR.
• Possess working knowledge of MS Office applications.
• Demonstrate good understanding of data handling techniques, analysis, especially involving use of statistical packages such as STATA, R or Python.
• Demonstrate excellent written and verbal communication skills in English
• Show ability to work as part of a team.