Sr. Scientist, Microbiologist

Indigo is a company dedicated to harnessing nature to help farmers sustainably feed the planet. With a vision of creating a world where farming is an economically desirable and accessible profession, Indigo works alongside its growers to apply natural approaches, conserve resources for future generations, and grow healthy food for all. Indigo’s Biological Products, Marketplace, and Carbon offerings improve grower profitability, environmental sustainability, and consumer health. Indigo Marketplace is a platform connecting growers with a network of buyers to secure optimal prices for their crops and offers hands-on control of a grower’s business through a range of pricing tools, real-time national bid discovery, and automated grain sales. Indigo Carbon, is a platform paying growers for increases in soil carbon content and decreases in greenhouse gas emissions. It helps growers realize additional revenue, healthier soils, and a more resilient farm by participation in a market of high-quality carbon credits – supported by rigorous quantification standards. The company is headquartered in Boston, MA, with additional offices in Memphis, TN, Research Triangle Park, NC, Basel, Switzerland, Buenos Aires, Argentina, and São Paulo, Brazil.

Indigo’s Biological Products organization develops products based upon our deep understanding of the plant microbiome. The company has commercialized such products for cotton, wheat, barley, corn, soybeans, and rice in North America, Latin America, and Europe under the biotrinsic™ brand. Our R&D and product development teams are working to continue to develop products that address the growing number of abiotic and biotic stresses that crops experience worldwide.

Core to our microbial discovery pipeline are varied in vitro and in planta screens to understand the activities and mechanism of action of our microbial product candidates. To support these efforts, our Microbial Sourcing and Evaluation team seeks a skilled Scientist/Senior Scientist, with experience in assay development and optimization, analysis of varied data streams from genomic to in vitro and in planta assay data, and molecular techniques to enable mechanism of action studies. The Scientist should have broad experience in environmental microbiology and plant-microbe interactions, and ideally will be skilled in modern methods of genetic engineering of environmental microorganisms, including Gram-positive bacteria, Gram-negative bacteria, and/or filamentous fungi.

Responsibilities:

• Design and execute lab-based experiments;
• Generate and interpret data that supports product advancement and detailed understanding of product performance;
• Build-out of Indigo’s internal strain engineering platform;
• Genetic manipulation and pathway engineering in a range of soil- and plant-associated microorganisms, to address mechanism of action;
• Training and overseeing junior research associates in a range of molecular techniques;
• Work seamlessly across discovery, bioinformatic, and data science/management teams to analyze and draw insight from assay data.

Competencies:

• Familiar with microbial physiology and microbe-plant interactions;
• Experience in leading and managing a team of junior scientists;
• Experience with modern DNA cloning methods and bioinformatics tools for construct design;
• Excellent communication and team-work skills; able to communicate and work cross-functionally between teams including Bioinformatics, Microbial Sourcing, and Plant Physiological Analysis;
• Excellent data management and organizational skills; ability to analyze laboratory data and present insights to a broad audience;
• Creative and adaptable

Qualifications:

• Ph.D in Microbiology, Molecular Biology, or related field, with postdoctoral experience and/or experience in a fast-paced start-up environment;
• Established capability to design, conduct, optimize and execute on novel in vitro assay development efforts;
• Knowledge of microbial ecology, microbial physiology, plant-microbe interactions;
• Boston-based, or willing to relocate

Indigo is committed to living our values, specifically “creating a work environment where everyone feels respected, connected, and has opportunities to learn and grow.” As part of living our values, we strive to create a diverse and inclusive work environment where everyone feels they can be themselves and has an equal opportunity of succeeding.