Location: National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS), NIH, Rockville, Maryland, USA
Job Description: The Stem Cell Translation Laboratory (SCTL) at the NIH National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS) is looking to hire a full-time bioinformatician. The SCTL focuses on translating human pluripotent stem cells, such as induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs), into clinical applications and drug discovery by developing innovative technologies, methods, and comprehensive multi-omics datasets through differentiation into relevant cell types in 2D/3D cell culture systems.
A successful candidate will have a chance to develop their skills in a highly dynamic environment, embedded in a team of passionate scientists working on a wide range of projects related to translational stem cell biology. They will have a chance to interact with experienced bioinformaticians at NCATS and collaborators at top-academic institutions.
Core Responsibilities: Computational analysis is integral to the lab's efforts in the deep characterization of stem cell states and functional cell types from different developmental lineages. The individual should promptly turn around analysis results to respond to biologists’ ongoing projects, work on multiple projects in parallel and coordinate/oversee data analysis with external service providers.
Qualifications: Applicants should have a master’s degree or higher in bioinformatics, computational biology, or biomedical data science. The ideal candidate should have strong science communication skills, clear and effective data visualization skills, the ability to work well independently and in a team environment, creative problem-solving skills, and a proven ability to apply cutting-edge, rigorous standards of the bioinformatics fields. Applicants should possess a solid knowledge of R statistical programming language, familiarity with the handling, management, and storage of large-scale sequencing data, and experience querying public databases, including the SRA, GEO, and dbGaP.
Preferred qualifications include experience with next-generation sequencing methods on Illumina and 10x Genomics platforms (e.g., bulk and single-cell RNA-Seq, ChIP-seq methods such as MeDIP-seq, bulk and single-cell ATAC-seq, and miRNA-seq). Experience with other omics, such as WES, WGS, and targeted sequencing methods, are a plus. The ideal candidate will have experience with pre-processing tools for alignment, counting, or sequence analysis (e.g., Cell Ranger, STAR, HTSeq, featureCounts, salmon, GATK, etc.) and R packages designed for the above-mentioned methods (e.g., DESeq2, limma, Seurat, etc.). A solid understanding of clustering and dimensionality reduction techniques for big genomic datasets, experience with Python programming, and familiarity with Linux BASH scripting, which is necessary for proper utilization of the NIH's high-performance computing capabilities, are preferred.
How to Apply: Interested individuals should send a cover letter, a curriculum vitae with a bibliography, and the contact information for at least three references to NCATSstemcellhiring@mail.nih.gov. The review of applications will begin immediately and will continue until the position is filled.
