Postdoctoral Fellow, Jan Lab - Parkinson's Disease

Calico Life Sciences; South San Francisco (CA); On-site; USD 95,000; Full time

Job summary

A leading research and development firm in South San Francisco is seeking a Postdoctoral Fellow with a PhD in a relevant field. The role involves independent research on aging, contributing to Calico's mission to understand age-related diseases. Candidates must demonstrate strong teamwork and communication skills, and be willing to work onsite five days each week. This is an exciting opportunity to make significant contributions to scientific advancements. The estimated base salary for this role is $95,000.

Qualifications

• Must have completed a PhD within the past 3 years and not have been employed as a postdoc at more than one other lab/company.
• Experience should include meaningful contributions to science, demonstrated by a first-author paper.
• Must be willing to work onsite five days per week.

Responsibilities

• Lead independent research focusing on new directions with dedicated resources.
• Contribute to understanding aging and age-related diseases.
• Execute experiments meticulously and analyze data.

Skills

Strong teamwork and communication skills

Detail-oriented

Analytical skills

Time management

Technical versatility

Education

PhD degree in a relevant scientific or computational field

Job description

Who We Are

Calico (Calico Life Sciences LLC) is an Alphabet‑founded research and development company whose mission is to harness advanced technologies and model systems to increase our understanding of the biology that controls human aging. Calico will use that knowledge to devise interventions that enable people to lead longer and healthier lives. Calico’s highly innovative technology labs, its commitment to curiosity‑driven discovery science, and, with academic and industry partners, its vibrant drug‑development pipeline together create an inspiring and exciting place to catalyze and enable medical breakthroughs.

The Calico Postdoctoral Fellowship Program

We are seeking ambitious early‑career scientists to join us in our mission to increase our understanding of the biology that controls human aging. This is a unique opportunity for individuals to distinguish themselves in aging research, deepen scientific training, and develop research independence.

The Postdoctoral Fellowship is a fixed‑term educational assignment (three years with a potential fourth year extension) with rolling start dates. Postdoctoral Fellows are fully integrated into Calico’s labs and community.

The program is designed to train individuals to become independent investigators in an academic or industry setting upon successful completion of the assignment. Fellows will receive regular feedback and guidance from their mentor(s) and participate in a formal annual review process to review project progress and individual performance and provide career coaching.

Responsibilities

• Lead Independent Research: Focus on your own project(s), pursuing new research directions with dedicated resources for innovative and potentially high‑risk/high‑reward research.
• Contribute to Calico’s Core Mission: Further the understanding of aging and age‑related diseases.
• Drive Scientific Progress: Execute experiments meticulously, analyze data (including computational analysis if applicable), and troubleshoot procedures as needed.
• Publish Work: Generate work that is expected to be submitted for publication in a timely fashion upon completion of the assignment.
• Collaborate and Communicate: Actively collaborate across Calico’s diverse teams and scientific community, including presenting progress and results to diverse audiences of computational scientists, lab scientists, and engineers.
• Professional Development: Engage with a community of other Postdoctoral Fellows and senior leadership through professional and career development opportunities, such as the annual Postdoc Summit, research‑in‑progress presentations, senior leader lunch sessions, and skill‑building workshops.

Position Requirements

The successful candidate will demonstrate characteristics valued across Calico’s programs, including being a self‑motivated team player, detail‑oriented, extremely organized, and comfortable working on complex problems.

• Education: Must have recently completed a PhD degree in a relevant scientific or computational field.
  • Current PhD student applicants should be within 12 months of completing their PhD.
  • Applicants who have already graduated must have completed their PhD within the past 3 years and not have been employed as a postdoc at more than one other lab/company since graduation.
• Experience: Must have made important contributions to science in their area, ideally demonstrated by having had a meaningful first‑author paper accepted for publication.
• Technical Versatility (General): While specific technical skills are project‑dependent, proficiency in core scientific methodologies, analytical skills, and quantitative problem‑solving is essential.
• Communication: Strong teamwork and communication skills are required.
• Adaptability: Must be flexible and able to respond quickly to shifting priorities, demonstrating a "can‑do" attitude.
• Onsite Availability: Must be willing to work onsite five days per week.

Application Requirements

The Postdoctoral Fellowship has four application components:

• Research proposal (a 1‑2 page creative and original research proposal on what you’d like to investigate in the Jan Lab during your fellowship – note that project goals may evolve during the training period).
• Updated CV with a full list of publications.
• Cover letter.
• List of 2‑3 references that we may contact, including your PhD thesis advisor and any postdoctoral advisors (if applicable).

The estimated base salary for this role is $95,000. More information on our postdoctoral fellowship program can be found here.

About The Jan Lab

We are interested in understanding the causes of Parkinson’s Disease and seek to use this knowledge to identify disease‑modifying targets. We collaborate broadly to integrate genetic, genomic and biomarker data from idiopathic PD patients to develop novel hypotheses and to guide the development of cellular and in vivo models of PD‑related cell states in which we can test these hypotheses. We also develop and deploy a variety of functional genomics tools to interrogate these systems using both biochemically‑precise phenotypic screens and holistic cell state screens based on representation learning of morphological and transcriptomic data.

We are currently welcoming applicants interested in understanding the cellular mechanisms that drive neurodegenerative processes.

Publications From The Group Include

• David Harris & Calvin Jan, CRISP uRe‑seq: pooled screening of barcoded ribonucleoprotein reports reveals regulation of RNA polymerase III transcription by the integrated stress response via mTOR (2025) Nucleic Acids Research.
• Meraj Ramezani et al., A genome‑wide atlas of cell morphology (2025) Nature Methods.
• John Yong et al., Impairment of lipid homeostasis causes accumulation of protein aggregates in the lysosome (2024) eLife.