Assistant or Associate Professor Space Biology / Astrobiology

Job Description

This is a 9-month tenure-accruing position that will be 30% teaching (College of Agricultural and Life Sciences) and 70% research available in the Microbiology and Cell Science Department, Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences (Space Life Sciences Laboratory, Merritt Island FL). Duties will include teaching a 3-credit course in space life sciences to students at the undergraduate and graduate levels annually, training PhD students, and contributing to the graduate curriculum. The incumbent will also assist with curriculum development for new BS, MS, and PhD programs in space sciences currently being formed across campus and teach courses within these programs. Research related to the fields of space biology, space biomanufacturing, and/or astrobiology (e.g. extremophile research) are of particular interest. Tenure will accrue in the Department of Microbiology and Cell Science. The faculty member will seek contract and grant funding actively to support their program, with federal competitive grant support being particularly important. The faculty member will engage in extension activities in their program area.

The successful candidate will engage in scholarly activities related to instruction, including teaching undergraduate and/or graduate courses, advising and mentoring undergraduate and graduate students, participating in curriculum revision and enhancement, seeking funding for the teaching program, supervising undergraduate and graduate research and creative work, publishing teaching-related scholarship, producing learning tools, and engaging in professional development activities related to teaching and advising. Faculty are encouraged to support and participate in the CALS Honors Program, distance education, and international education.

Because of the IFAS land-grant mission, all faculty are expected to be supportive of and engaged in all three mission areas—research, teaching and extension—regardless of the assignment split specified in the position description.