Decoding tissues to understand human disease

Our laboratory focuses on the development and application of spatial technologies to decode human disease. Our range of technologies allows an integrative characterization of tissues at different biological scales (ie. from intact organs to sub-cellular compartments) combining morphological and multi-layered molecular data. Projects in our laboratory will focus on the development of a new spatial application combined with a relevant translational topic with direct patient impact - for more details please refer to our publication record.

Each project will be developed with suitable candidates considering their previous experience, research interest and potential impact of the project in pre-clinical or clinical care. Candidates interested in wet-lab work (especially tissue processing and microscopy) and/or dry-lab work (especially deep learning) are welcome to apply and discuss potential projects. Our current fields of interest range from immune-mediated kidney diseases, COVID-19, end-organ damage in diabetes, immune-mediated liver and intestinal diseases, neurological disorders, and bone marrow fibrosis.

In principle, we are interested in any candidate from any scientific background, as we believe that we can learn and benefit from any scientific discipline. However, some profiles will be beneficial to quickly integrate into our team:

1. Team-oriented mindset, open to collaborations and able to support other team members. Candidates that prefer to work on their own and dislike working as part of a team should consider other laboratories.
2. Excellent communication skills (English certification or previous experience living/working in English-speaking countries would be considered an advantage).
3. Familiarity with advanced light microscopy will be considered an advantage, but is not essential.
4. Familiarity with basic computational image analysis concepts will be considered an advantage, but is not essential.
5. Previous experience writing grant applications and manuscripts in biomedicine will be considered an advantage, but is not essential.

Our expertise can be divided in technical and personal development:

Technical:

• Classical histopathology analyses, including pathology assessment
• As we are based in the Department of Pathology (Aarhus University Hospital), we have direct access to pathology specimens, which in Denmark can be linked to complex clinical data
• Whole organ mapping using optical clearing (tissue transparency)
• Cellular mapping, including technologies for mRNA, protein and phospho-protein profiling with high resolution (multimodal multiplexed imaging)
• Sub-cellular mapping, including expansion microscopy and computational image enhancement (reaching a resolution of approx. 25nm)
• Computational image analysis, including new analysis of highly multiplexed data, and deep learning-based models to perform automatic analyses and extract as much information as possible (small samples, big data)
• Extensive experience in advanced light microscopy, including confocal, two-photon, light sheet
• Access to our own microscopes, including confocal and light sheet systems

Personal development:

• Close and individualized supervision
• Career planning and skill development
• Extensive networking opportunities
• Friendly, enthusiastic and supportive team
• International laboratory with a second site in Hamburg

More about the research group