EPA Advancing Human Thyroid NAMs for Endocrine Disruption Screening

EPA Office/Lab and Location

The participant will receive training in a laboratory located in Research Triangle Park, NC office and travel to Washington, DC once a year for a debriefing.

Research Project

The objective of this project is to increase the confidence in applying and using data derived from human-based thyroid organotypic culture models (OCMs) to enable more robust assessments of thyroid disrupting chemicals.

• Evaluate the inter-individual variability in a human organotypic thyroid assay to establish benchmarks and acceptance criteria.
• Define chemical training sets for the technical validation of human organotypic thyroid assays.
• Conduct an intra-laboratory validation study to support the standardization and performance assessment of a human organotypic thyroid assay.

Learning Objectives

• Gain engagement and leadership skills in the design and execution of experimental research in a toxicology laboratory setting.
• Develop technical proficiency in the use and implementation of laboratory automation technologies for high-throughput drug and chemical screening.
• Build expertise in computational toxicology approaches by leading data analysis efforts.
• Gain skills with active participation in project team, branch and division meetings.
• Gain skills with preparing presentations, internal reports and data summaries.
• Gain skills with presenting at scientific conferences.
• Gain skills with authoring manuscripts for publication in peer-reviewed journals.

Mentor(s)

The mentor for this opportunity is Scott Lynn (lynn.scott@epa.gov).

Participant Stipend

The participant will receive a monthly stipend commensurate with educational level and experience. The anticipated stipend range is $77,983 - $93,468 annually.

Citizenship Requirements

This opportunity is available to U.S. citizens only.

EPA Security Clearance

Completion of a successful background investigation by the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) is required for an applicant to be on-boarded at EPA.

ORISE Information

ORISE offers all ORISE EPA graduate students and Postdocs a free 5 year membership to the National Postdoctoral Association (NPA).

Qualifications

The qualified candidate should have received a doctoral degree in one of the relevant fields (cell/molecular biology, biochemistry, toxicology, environmental science, or a closely related field). Degree must have been received within the past five years.

Preferred Skills

• Knowledge and experience with the application of primary mammalian cells for the development, optimization, and implementation of simple and complex organotypic models and assays.
• Proficiency with the operation of laboratory automation and analytical technologies.
• Experience with basic statistical methods and software (e.g. GraphPad Prism) or object-oriented programming (R, Python).
• Demonstrated ability to communicate scientific findings through peer-reviewed publications and oral presentations.