Research Lab Tech II

The Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, located at USC Keck School of Medicine, is seeking a full-time Research Laboratory Technician II to join our research team of highly skilled senior research associates, technicians, and faculty researchers. Under the direction of Principal Investigators, our research studies focus on peptidic effectors of mammalian innate immunity for drug development.

• Perform in vitro (cell culture) and in vivo (rodent) experiments to evaluate physiologic and molecular effects and mechanisms of peptidic agents.
• Test a library of synthetic peptides for their immunomodulatory properties in infection and inflammatory disease models.
• Administer peptide treatment while collecting data for clinical/in-life presentation of disease (survivability, weight gain/loss, disease severity, mortality, and/or morbidity).
• Collect post‑mortem indicators of disease (bacterial or fungal burden), harvest organs for histochemical analysis, collect blood for pharmacokinetics, and enumerate bacterial/fungal load as a function of peptide treatment.
• Inoculate rodents with pathogens by intraperitoneal or intravenous injections, give drug treatment or placebos to infected animals, maintain a rodent colony, measure weights, and record visual observations.
• Analyze pharmacokinetics using uninfected rabbits as a secondary model.
• Obtain, maintain, and graph data.

Minimum Education:

Associate's degree, specialized/technical training, combined experience/education as a substitute for minimum education.

Minimum Experience:

2 years.

Minimum Field of Expertise:
Working knowledge of laboratory equipment and research protocols; knowledge of computer analysis techniques and ability to provide routine analysis and interpretation of research data.

Highly

Preferred Experience:

Previous general scientific laboratory research practices and rodent animal handling are required for this position.

The University offers a competitive salary and benefit package.

Hourly range: $25.71 - $31.30. This is a grant‑funded position. Flexible hours will be required.

When extending an offer of employment, the University of Southern California considers factors such as scope and responsibilities of the position, the candidate’s work experience, education/training, key skills, internal peer equity, federal, state, and local laws, contractual stipulations, grant funding, as well as external market and organizational considerations.