Masters Project Offered in Ribosomal RNA Operon Capture for Pathogen Identification

Topic: In some clinical cases it can be very hard to identify the pathogen causing an infection. Perhaps the load of bacteria is very low, or the sample was not optimally stored, or the bacterium is complicated to identify. We plan to use target enrichment / sequence capture to analyse complete rRNA operons of bacteria for high resolution identification of bacteria (at the DNA / RNA level) from (otherwise) sterile clinical samples. Requirements: Interest in microbial genomics bioinformatics; command line and HPC knowledge; prepared for half laboratory based, half computer based project. Specific bioinformatic methods will be researched / taught. Please Note: There is no funding associated with this project. Ideally you will already be enrolled at the UZH (https://www.uzh.ch/en/studies/programs/master.html) or a local University / Fachhochschule. In terms of living costs, the university recommends that students have around 3000 CHF per month to live in Zurich. Application: Please contact PD Dr Helena Seth-Smith with your CV if interested.