Company description Seed Savers Exchange is a non-profit organization based in Decorah, Iowa focused on conserving and promoting America's culturally diverse but endangered garden and food crop heritage for future generations. Job description Seed Savers Exchange is seeking a Tissue Culture Laboratory Technician to join our team. The ideal candidate should have a bachelor’s degree in biology, horticulture, or a related field and experience with laboratory work or performing plant tissue culture.

Primary Role:
The Tissue Culture Lab Technician will utilize their technical skill and knowledge to maintain the potato and sweet potato tissue culture collections in vitro. The Tissue Culture Lab Technician will also assist with collection curation, potato evaluation, potato history research, and field support.

Essential Duties and Responsibilities:

• Independently perform tissue culture work in an organized and timely manner
• Perform all tissue culture lab activities including making media, performing transfers, inducting new material, cleaning test tubes, maintaining inventory records, entering data, organizing growth chambers, scouting for contamination, and ordering supplies
• Work to eradicate viruses from the potato collection by using shoot-tip meristem culture and thermo/chemotherapy or other best practices
• Evaluate short term and long term tissue culture methods, strategies, and protocols for efficiency and soundness
• Select and schedule varieties for annual growouts

Other Departmental Responsibilities:

• Assist Field Ops and other Preservation staff with farming duties during peak times of the growing season
• Work with Evaluation team to evaluate potato varieties
• Work with Seed Historians to research potato histories

External-Department Responsibilities:

• Professionally represent SSE while interacting with members, visitors, board members and guests during informal interactions, tours, presentations, and workshops.

Skills:

• Experience with plant tissue culture is ideal but not required
• Experience with laboratory work
• Excellent attention to detail and strong organizational skills
• Ability to work independently and as part of a team
• Strong analytical and creative problem solving skills
• Exceptional time-management skills
• Flexibility and ability to balance workload

Physical Requirements:

• Ability to sit for long periods of time during tissue culture procedures
• Ability to work in temperature extremes during field work
• Ability to lift at least 25 pounds

Qualifications:

• Bachelor’s degree in horticulture, botany, plant science, or a related field, or a combination of education and experience

Benefits:

• Employee/children health insurance
• Paid Time Off
• Paid Holidays
• Paid Long Term Disability
• Paid Life Insurance
• 40% discount on merchandise
• 401K retirement plan
• Wellness benefit

Compensation this position is : hourly, $15-20/hr Application instructions Deadlineno deadline