Harvard Medical School and Brigham & Women’s Hospital
Postdoctoral Position Available in The Neurogenomics Laboratory
Computational Biologist in Brain Research
The Neurogenomics Laboratory envisions and is building a future precision medicine for Parkinson’s, Huntington’s, and other neurologic diseases, where genome-wide DNA, RNA, and various regulatory information is integrated for much earlier diagnosis, personalized prognosis, tailored treatments, and response tracking. We are looking for an enthusiastic, highly motivated, science-driven and experienced postdoctoral fellow to join our team to unravel how the genome functions in the human brain. The focus of this project is to answer two key questions for the future of neuroscience: How do GWAS-derived genetic risk variants cause brain disease? How can we harness this information for precision therapies? Genotyping, RNA-seq, microRNA-seq, and allele-specific gene expression analyses in >>100 human brains and biofluid samples will be performed to address this questions. See http://www.scherzerlaboratory.org/ for more background.
Your tasks: By joining the bioinformatics team and working together with molecular biologists from the wet lab, the Postdoctoral Fellow will perform a variety of standard analysis, such as RNA-seq, small RNA-seq, expression Quantitative Trait Locus (eQTL), allele-specific gene expression, and advanced integrative analysis such as network and pathway analyses.
Other responsibilities include:
- Develop and implement algorithms and statistical methods to analyze large-scale sequencing data
- Design and develop innovative data visualization methods to support genome analysis
- Publish and present novel research findings in academic journals and conferences
- Develop and maintain collaborations both within Harvard Medical School and also with outside researchers in academia and industry.
Your qualifications: Applicants are expected to have Ph. D. or equivalent doctoral degree in bioinformatics, computer science, genomics, physics, or statistics. Ideal applicant should have strong programming skills in (R & (Perl | Python | C | C++ | Java)) and good knowledge in algorithms and tools development. Experience in Unix shell scripting is a big plus. Prior experience in analyzing high-throughput sequencing data (RNA-seq, ChIP-seq, small RNA sequencing etc.) is preferred. Advanced usage of large biological repositories, such as UCSC Genome Browser, Ensembl is a plus. Knowledge in gene regulation is a plus. Experience in GWAS, eQTL, allele-specific gene expression is a plus. Excellent English communication skills are required. Prior experience in genetics or neurosciences is encouraged. Candidates must have a track record in publication. Furthermore, the ability to work in a team and experience in the supervision of students are an asset.
This fully funded position is available for an initial one-year appointment with the possibility of extension. Salary will be commensurate with experience.
Please submit your application, including a statement of research interests, a biosketch, and three references to Kris Vernon (kvernon@partners.org) and cc to Dr. Scherzer (cscherzer@partners.org).
