Post Doctoral Research Fellow

Site: The McLean Hospital Corporation

Mass General Brigham relies on a wide range of professionals, including doctors, nurses, business people, tech experts, researchers, and systems analysts to advance our mission. As a not-for-profit, we support patient care, research, teaching, and community service, striving to provide exceptional care. We believe that high-performing teams drive groundbreaking medical discoveries and invite all applicants to join us and experience what it means to be part of Mass General Brigham.

Job Summary

McLean Hospital is a comprehensive psychiatric hospital committed to providing easy access to superior quality, cost-effective mental health services in the Boston area, Massachusetts and beyond. Since 1811, McLean Hospital has been a world leader in the treatment of mental illness and chemical dependency, research into the cause of mental illness and the training of generations of mental health care providers. McLean's multidisciplinary programs treat a broad range of psychiatric illnesses across the full continuum of care.

All McLean team members are expected to consistently demonstrate our values of integrity, compassion, respect, diversity, teamwork, excellence and innovation in their work activities and interactions.

A post-doctoral fellow typically holds dual affiliations at McLean Hospital and Harvard Medical School.

There are many opportunities for education and growth in our multidisciplinary, collaborative research environment at McLean Hospital that brings together a diverse group of neurobiologists, clinicians, psychologists and statisticians. Please see https://www.mcleanhospital.org/research

• Job Description
• With supervision and guidance, responsibilities of the Postdoctoral Research Fellow will include:
• o Performs independent and highly specialized experimental procedures
• o Designs and implements modifications of research protocols
• o Troubleshooting problems and instructing colleagues in highly specialized techniques
• o Synthesizes and interprets results
• o Performs advanced data recording and analysis using various software programs and statistical techniques
• o Maintaining organized and detailed records of laboratory experiments in electronic laboratory notebooks
• o Presentation of results at lab meetings and national conferences
• o Preparation and submission of research manuscripts to peer-reviewed journals
• o Assisting with preparation of grant applications
• o Other duties as assigned

• A successful candidate will:
• o Work independently under general direction of the Principal Investigator
• o Be motivated, meticulous, organized, and detail-oriented
• o Demonstrate initiative and enthusiasm for learning new techniques
• o Have strong analytical and problem-solving skills
• o Possess strong technical abilities and computer science skills
• o Possess exceptional written and oral communication skills as demonstrated by publications and presentation
• o Possess the ability to make independent and effective decisions in a timely fashion
• o Possess competence in research techniques and methodologies
• o Have excellent interpersonal skills
• o Be a team player who works well with other lab members

Additional Job Description

• Postdoctoral Fellow in Translational Neuroscience and McLean Hospital Microscopy Core Manager
• The Translational Neuroscience Laboratory at McLean Hospital and Harvard Medical School seeks a highly motivated scientist for a combined position as a postdoctoral fellow and Manager of the McLean Hospital Microscopy Core. This position offers a distinctive opportunity to pursue research on the cellular and molecular mechanisms underlying psychiatric disorders while providing scientific and operational leadership for a shared advanced-microscopy facility.
• Postdoctoral Research Program
• The postdoctoral fellow will contribute to a multidisciplinary research program examining how stress and immune signaling affect interactions among neurons, glia, and the neurovascular unit (NVU). The NVU—including brain endothelial cells, pericytes, astrocytes, microglia, neurons, and the vascular basal lamina—is positioned at the interface between systemic and neural processes and may play a critical role in translating immune, metabolic, and other stress-related challenges into altered neural function and psychiatric symptoms.
• The research investigates the hypothesis that stress-related symptom dimensions—including anxiety, irritability, depression, and anhedonia—are associated with dysregulation of NVU homeostatic reserve: the capacity of NVU cells to respond adaptively to stress and immune challenges. Studies will examine coordinated gene-expression programs across neuronal, glial, and vascular cell populations and determine how their disruption relates to clinically relevant symptom dimensions across psychiatric diagnoses.
• The fellow will work with deeply characterized human postmortem brain specimens, primarily from the amygdala and anterior cingulate cortex, and with cellular preparations derived from the same donors. Molecular, cellular, and morphological findings will be integrated with transdiagnostic clinical phenotypes derived from extensive health records using natural-language-processing approaches.
• Research activities may include:
• •Advanced fluorescence, confocal, two-photon, and electron microscopy.
• •Quantitative image analysis and three-dimensional reconstruction.
• •Multiplex in situ RNA and protein detection in human brain tissue.
• •Morphological and cytoarchitectonic analyses of neurons, glia, microvasculature, and other NVU components.
• •Primary human astrocyte, microglial, and brain endothelial cell cultures derived from postmortem tissue.
• •iPSC-derived glial and vascular cell models, including comparisons with primary cells and native tissue from the same donors.
• •Experiments examining cellular responses to cytokines, stress neuropeptides, and immune or metabolic challenges.
• •Single-cell or single-nucleus transcriptomic studies of brain tissue, isolated microvasculature, and cultured cells.
• •Integration of molecular, cellular, morphological, and functional measures with transdiagnostic dimensions of stress-related symptoms.
• The fellow will be encouraged to develop independent research questions within this program and will contribute to experimental design, data analysis and interpretation, scientific presentations, manuscript preparation, and grant applications.
• Microscopy Core Management
• In parallel with the postdoctoral research program, the successful candidate will manage the scientific, technical, operational, and financial activities of the McLean Hospital Microscopy Core. The Core Manager will serve as a front-line scientific resource for McLean investigators and external users, providing expert guidance on microscopy-based study design, sample preparation, data acquisition, image processing, and quantitative analysis.
• The Core Manager will oversee the overall functioning of the facility, coordinate instrument access and maintenance, train and support users, supervise contracted technical services, and serve as a liaison among investigators, hospital administrative units, vendors, and external service providers. The role also includes consultation on microscopy-related methods, project feasibility, budgeting, and appropriate use of Core resources.
• Transmission Electron Microscopy
• Responsibilities will include:
• •Maintain the Reichert-Jung ultramicrotome and ancillary TEM equipment.
• •Oversee the operation and maintenance of the JEOL JEM1200EX transmission electron microscope and associated cooling systems.
• •Conduct TEM studies for McLean and external investigators.
• •Provide expertise in resin embedding, sample preparation, ultramicrotomy, staining, image acquisition, and image processing.
• •Perform and support immuno-electron microscopy.
• •Perform cryopreservation and freeze substitution of biological specimens.
• •Conduct electron tomography on ultrathin sections and reconstruct tomographic datase