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Postdoctoral Research Opportunity – Neuroscience and the Human Olfactory System and Respiration

June 29, 2026

Northwestern University’s Human Olfaction Lab is seeking a postdoctoral scholar to join their research team. The lab studies systems neuroscience, including the human olfactory system and respiration, and how the two interact. The lab uses a wide range of human neuroscience methods, including functional neuroimaging, diffusion tensor imaging, intracranial EEG, electrical stimulation, and new method that we recently developed that allows for high-precision electrophysiological recordings from the human olfactory bulb in healthy volunteers, and fast-scan-cyclic voltammetry based electrochemistry recordings from the olfactory epithelium. The lab is conducting experiments in healthy normosmic individuals, and also in disease populations including Alzheimer, Parkinson’s and epilepsy.

Principal Accountabilities

  1. To conduct and analyze data from experiments on olfaction, respiration, and or disease.
  2. To develop new ideas, research methodologies, and analytic approaches to our lab’s research programs.
  3. To help write grants and compete for funding.
  4. To help write and contribute to publications resulting from research done in the lab.

Minimum Qualifications/Competencies: 

  • Interest in research on olfaction and/or respiration and/or how these systems are affected in disease.
  • Computational skills (machine learning, RSA, pattern analysis, k-means clustering, modeling, etc) in analyzing neural data, preferably across a range of techniques including electrophysiology and neuroimaging.
  • Evidence of first-author peer-reviewed publications.
  • Excellent communication and writing skills

Preferred Qualifications/Competencies: 

  • Experience in human neuroscience research.
  • Experience in research and clinical training related to neurological conditions are preferred, but not a necessity.
  • Skillsets on computational, AI (broadly defined), and data science analytic approaches are an advantage.

To Apply:
Email a cover letter, cv, and 2 references contact info to Christina Zelano.