USDA-ARS Permanent Research Plant Physiologist / Soil Scientist / Agricultural Engineer Position

The U.S. Department of Agriculture, Agricultural Research Service, Beltsville Agricultural Research Center, Adaptive Cropping Systems Laboratory in Beltsville, Maryland is seeking an energetic and motivated applicant for a fulltime Research Plant Physiologist/ Research Soil Scientist/ Agricultural Engineer position. The candidate chosen for this position will be a part of a highly experienced, diverse, and multifaceted team whose mission is to evaluate and assess crop responses to climate change, develop adaptation and mitigation strategies, apply systems theory to the solution of complex, agricultural problems and to develop computer‐aided farm decision support systems and assessment tools for environmental study and analysis.

The ideal candidate would be a systems level thinker with strong quantitative/programming skills and experienced in controlled environment chamber and/or field experiments. We are seeking an individual with a diverse background who would use these skills to investigate and quantify bio-physical interactions within the soil-plant-atmospheric system at a range of temporal and spatial scales as part of the project “Experimentally Assessing and Modeling the Impact of Climate and Management on the Resiliency of Crop-Weed-Soil Agro-Ecosystems.” The applicant will conceptualize and develop innovative mechanistic crop and soil modeling approaches to quantify and simulate complex, multifaceted agricultural systems issues in response to a changing climate and resource availability. Where knowledge gaps exist, the incumbent will design and execute growth chamber and field experiments to acquire agronomic data and test hypotheses related to genetic (G), environment (E), and management (M) knowledge gaps and improve crop models. State of the art outdoor sunlit and indoor growth chambers are available for this research. The chosen candidate will be free to develop research plans and conduct experiments within the overall objectives of the Management Unit and be expected to coordinate, evaluate, and manage human, fiscal and physical resources for the project. The incumbent will disseminate research findings in peer-reviewed journals and provides consultation, both internal and external to ARS.
This position has a basic education requirement for each series. Applicants are only required to meet at least one of the basic requirements (see Job Opportunity Announcement on usajobs.gov for full details on basic education requirement).
Experience is required conducting research in the area of plant physiology, soil science, or agricultural engineering; utilizing field plots, controlled environment chambers, and modeling approaches for agricultural systems issues including evidence of programming with high-level computer languages such as FORTRAN, C++, PYTHON, R, or others; publishing research results in peer reviewed journals related to plant physiology, soil science, or agricultural engineering; and collaborating with stakeholders.

For more information, and to apply,  search www.usajobs.gov with the following announcement number: ARS-D22Y-11607675-SL.  Please contact Drs. V.R. Reddy (vr.reddy@usda.gov) or David Fleisher (david.fleisher@usda.gov) with questions.  US citizenship is required at time of application.