(Senior) Group Leader, Plant Phenotyping - Plant Biology Institute

Join us at EIT:

At the Ellison Institute of Technology (EIT), we're on a mission to translate scientific discovery into real world impact. We bring together visionary scientists, technologists, engineers, researchers, educators and innovators to tackle humanity's greatest challenges in four transformative areas:

• Health, Medical Science & Generative Biology
• Food Security & Sustainable Agriculture
• Climate Change & Managing CO₂
• Artificial Intelligence & Robotics
  
  

This is ambitious work - work that demands curiosity, courage, and a relentless drive to make a difference. At EIT, you'll join a community built on excellence, innovation, tenacity, trust, and collaboration, where bold ideas become real-world breakthroughs. Together, we push boundaries, embrace complexity, and create solutions to scale ideas from lab to society. Explore more at www.eit.org.

Welcome to the Plant Biology Institute:

The Plant Biology Institute, headed by Professor Steve Kelly, is a key part of the Ellison Institute of Technology (EIT) Oxford. The institute aims to develop impactful and commercially sustainable solutions for improving global food production and planetary health through pioneering plant science research.

The Plant Biology Institute will unite world-class researchers who are focused on expanding the frontiers of plant science. Our research is focused on enhancing our ability to feed the planet while simultaneously improving the climate and ecosystem outcomes of food production. By embedding cutting-edge plant science research within an organisation that is focused on solving global challenges at scale, we aim to accelerate the timeline from discovery to global impact.

Areas of exploration include:

• Improved plant productivity, both indoors and outside
• Reduced reliance on inputs including water, fertilisers, pesticides, and herbicides.

Novel decarbonised plant-based production platforms for food and medicines

Advanced technologies that speed up discovery and deployment in plants.

Researchers will have access to state-of-the-art laboratory and plant growth facilities and have opportunities to collaborate with experts at the forefront of research on AI, automation, and generative biology across the EIT ecosystem. They will also work with global leaders in market development, commercialisation, and impact creation. The Plant Biology Institute has long-term substantial funding to support the unique scale and ambition of its vision.

Your Role:

At EIT we are seeking a visionary and accomplished Group Leader/Senior Group Leader in Plant Phenotyping to lead a transformative research programme at the forefront of plant biotechnology. This senior leadership role is central to shaping a newly established and rapidly scaling Plant Biology Institute with the ambition to become a global leader in plant phenotyping and data-driven plant science. The successful candidate will lead an innovative research programme focused on the development and application of next-generation plant phenotyping technologies, including automated, high-throughput, and sensor-based approaches that enable precise, scalable measurement of plant performance across indoor and outdoor environments.

The successful candidate will establish and lead PBI's automated phenotyping function, delivering analytical capabilities and workflows to support PBI's trait and technology research groups. This role requires close collaboration with research scientists working across a broad range of projects including plant and plant cell culture engineering. The role will require working other institutional stakeholders to scope, design, equip, and operate a new function within the research institute. The role will drive research from foundational method development through to integrated platforms for real-world application, supporting advances in crop improvement, resilience, and productivity. The postholder will build and lead a high-performing, interdisciplinary team spanning biology, engineering, data science, and automation; establish strategic collaborations across academia, industry, and technology partners; and ensure research excellence is translated into impactful and commercially relevant solutions aligned with EIT's mission of humane and sustainable innovation. This is a rare opportunity to define the scientific and technological direction of a next-generation phenotyping programme addressing some of the most pressing challenges in global agriculture and sustainability.

Your Responsibilities: