Post-doctoral Researcher position at Católica Biomedical Research Centre - Claudio Franco Lab

We hereby announce an international call for applications for one vacancy of junior doctoral researcher to perform duties of scientific research and knowledge transfer (with an exclusivity clause), in the scientific field of Biology, Biochemistry, Bioengineering or similar fields. The research activities will be carried out at the Católica Biomedical Research Centre (CBR), Oeiras, Portugal, within the framework of the "Control of protein trafficking in vascular physiology and pathology", led by Professor Claudio Franco and funded by the Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia (2022.09228.PTDC).

Description of the research activities:

Task 1- Identify the molecular changes in EC vesicular trafficking upon flow stimulation.  To profile the proteome and surface of endothelial cells in control and KD, under static or flow conditions, to identify molecules that have an impact on vessel function. The candidates will then be validated using the RUSH system developed by Franck Perez's team (Institut Curie, France).

Task 2- Assess whether blood flow controls the trafficking of directional and polarised endothelial cell proteins during angiogenesis. We will infect HUVECs with a geneX-GFP lentivirus and perform live imaging of endothelial cells subjected to different levels of shear stress and study vesicle delivery patterns as a function of flow velocity.

Task 3- Investigate the effects of impaired vesicular trafficking on atherosclerosis. To this end, we will analyse geneX EC-specific KO and WT mice injected with AAV8-Pcsk9-D377Y virus to promote atherosclerotic plaque formation in C57BL/6J mice and analyse the effects of loss of geneX function on plaque formation.