Junior research scientist in genetic selection strategy for animal populations

Get to know us

The French National Research Institute for Agriculture, Food, and the Environment (INRAE) is a public research organisation. It is a community of 12,000 people with more than 200 research units and 42 experimental units located throughout France. As the first research institution in Europe for animal and plant sciences, INRAE carries out mission-oriented research for high-quality and healthy foods, competitive and sustainable agriculture and a preserved and valorised environment.

 

What will be your mission?

You will join the Genetics, Physiology, and Livestock Systems Joint Research Unit (UMR GenPhySE, 148 permanent staff), whose research aims to contribute to the agroecological transition of livestock systems through a better understanding of the biology of farm animals, the genetic determinism of traits, and strategies for selecting resilient animal populations. The unit combines expertise in biology, physiology, genomics, genetics, statistics, and bioinformatics.  Within this unit, you will join the Genetic Strategies for Multi-performance of Livestock Systems team, which models and designs new selection strategies for small ruminants, pigs, and rabbits adapted to global change. Climate change and emerging societal demands require livestock systems to evolve in accordance with the principles of the agroecological transition. You will be responsible for proposing innovative methods for organizing breeding programmes so that animal populations are suited to new farming conditions while reducing their environmental footprint. You will seek solutions at different levels, from the animal to the entire production system.

 

At animal level, you will identify optimal strategies that simultaneously address economic, environmental, and societal challenges. You will consider alternative approaches to the multiplication of traits, sometimes antagonistic, to be included in selection objectives. For instance, you will explore the benefits of strategies based on a trade-off between traits, modular selection, or the search for parsimony. Additionally, you will study the potential of integrating global or local environmental and societal impacts into selection. This could involve the introduction of specific indicators (such as methane emissions, water eutrophication potential, or animal welfare) or the definition of environmental and societal weights in the selection objective. At this stage, you will draw on knowledge of the genetic variability of traits and their interrelations studied by other teams within the unit. You will explore the potential of genetic resources available in genetic reservoirs outside the target population (introgression, recursive schemes, diversity management, etc.). This will lead you to consider crossbreeding within selection schemes, whether on an ad hoc or systematic basis, or to create new synthetic populations.

 

At system level, you will examine the potential of other strategies based on complementarity within the system. You could thus explore the possibility of selection to group sub-populations within a single herd selected according to distinct objectives ensuring their complementarity. This approach can be implemented intra-species, inter-species, or even across kingdoms for broader scales. Finally, you will be expected to propose strategies to anticipate and adapt to changes in production environments, notably through dynamic weightings. This requires finely integrating interactions between system elements (plant-animal, interspecies, etc.) in the design of selection strategies.

 

What are the conditions for applying?

Required Education Level: PhD or equivalent

 

Candidates with a strong expertise in quantitative genetics, as well as good knowledge of selection theory would be highly appreciated. Mastery of statistical and bioinformatics tools for working with large datasets and performing stochastic simulations is recommended. Knowledge of agronomy and an interest in livestock would be appreciated.  

 

Candidates should have a good command of English (both written and spoken), and long-term international experience would also be desirable. Successful candidates who have not yet acquired this experience abroad will be required to do so after their probationary period (1st year).

 

Location :

31320 CASTANET-TOLOSAN (FRANCE)

https://genphyse.inrae.fr/

 

Contact :

Ingrid DAVID ingrid.david@inrae.fr

Catherine LARZUL catherine.larzul@inrae.fr

 

How to apply

Join our research teams by sending in your application to our open competitions for research scientists until March 4, 2025 

 

The selection process includes a pre-selection based on the scientific file in April 2025 (no physical presence required), followed by final selections through interview, scheduled from June 2 to 18, 2025. Appointments will start from September 1, 2025