Positions

The laboratories of Dr. Jeff Milbrandt and Dr. Rob Mitra invite highly motivated candidates to apply for positions as joint postdoctoral fellows in the Department of Genetics and McDonnell Genome Institute at WashU in St. Louis. These fellows will develop research programs in Personalized Medicine aimed at revealing the pathogenic mechanisms of disease-associated variants via monitoring phenotypic changes of genetically perturbed iPSC-derived neurons and glia.

The Ushiki Lab investigates the molecular mechanisms of transcriptional regulation and how noncoding genetic variation alters gene regulation in human disease. Our work integrates functional genomics, human genetics, and in vivo experimental systems to understand enhancer function across regulatory and phenotypic scales. We develop and apply both experimental and computational approaches, including in vivo Massively Parallel Reporter Assays (MPRAs), to define the sequence basis and functional consequences of enhancer activity and to expand MPRA-based approaches to other aspects of transcriptional regulation. Ongoing work in the lab is supported by an NHGRI K99/R00 award and the Preeclampsia Foundation’s Peter Joseph Pappas Research Grant. In particular, this position will contribute to projects investigating the relationship between enhancer function and transcriptional elongation, termination, and RNA processing/splicing.

The Cremins lab works at the spatial biology-technology interface to understand chromatin-to-synapse communication during neural circuit activation in the mammalian brain. We aim to understand how chromatin works through long-range physical folding mechanisms to encode neuronal specification and long-term synaptic plasticity in healthy and diseased neural circuits. We pursue a multi-disciplinary approach integrating data across biological scales in the brain, including molecular Chromosome-Conformation-Capture sequencing technologies, single-cell imaging, optogenetics, genome engineering, induced pluripotent stem cell differentiation to neurons/organoids, and in vitro and in vivo electrophysiological measurements.

The Ushiki Lab investigates the molecular mechanisms of cis-regulatory function and how noncoding genetic variation alters gene regulation in human disease. Our work integrates functional genomics, human genetics, and in vivo experimental systems to understand enhancer function across regulatory and phenotypic scales. We develop and apply both experimental and computational approaches, including in vivo Massively Parallel Reporter Assays (MPRAs), to define the sequence basis and functional consequences of enhancer activity and to expand MPRA-based approaches to other aspects of transcriptional regulation. Ongoing work in the lab is supported by an NHGRI K99/R00 award and the Preeclampsia Foundation’s Peter Joseph Pappas Research Grant.

The Cremins lab works at the spatial biology-technology interface to understand chromatin-to-synapse communication during neural circuit activation in the mammalian brain. We aim to understand how chromatin works through long-range physical folding mechanisms to encode neuronal specification and long-term synaptic plasticity in healthy and diseased neural circuits. We pursue a multi-disciplinary approach integrating data across biological scales in the brain, including molecular Chromosome-Conformation-Capture sequencing technologies, single-cell imaging, optogenetics, genome engineering, induced pluripotent stem cell differentiation to neurons/organoids, and in vitro and in vivo electrophysiological measurements.