Connectionists: Early Career Research Fellowship in Systems Biology for Food and Disease

[Steuber, Volker]

Early Career Research Fellowship in Systems Biology for Food and Disease
University of Hertfordshire
School of Life and Medical Sciences, Department of Biological and Environmental Sciences

Closing Date: 27th Oct 2016
Salary £31,656 - £37,768 per annum depending on skills and experience.
Full time position working 37 hours per week.
Fixed term contract for a period of five years.

The postdoctoral fellowship will focus on emerging methods in biocomputation to improve food and health or combat plant, animal or human diseases. A first degree in biology, computer science or a relevant subject and a doctoral degree in bioinformatics, machine learning, quantitative biology or related subjects is required. Experience in systems biology, big data science or genomics will be useful. The fellowship is offered for a period of 5 years with the expectation that the fellow will obtain a permanent academic post supported.

Qualifications required: You must have a first degree in a science, such as biology, computer science, mathematics or a relevant subject, and a doctoral degree in areas such as bioinformatics, machine learning, quantitative biology or a related subject area.  Experience in systems biology, big data science or genomics will be useful.

Research focus and environment: The Fellow is expected to develop her/his own line of research. This should include a focus on emerging methods in biocomputation that generate and exploit large data sets of biological information to better understand mechanisms such as those underlying host resistance/immunity and/or resistance breakdown.  The Fellow will generate an improved understanding of relevant biological systems to develop specific strategies to improve food and health or combat plant, animal or human diseases.  This Fellowship will be supported by existing collaborations between colleagues in Schools of Life & Medical Sciences (Kukol, Stotz, Barling, Fitt) and Computer Science (Steuber).  The Fellow is expected to use the University’s high performance computer cluster.

Experience and skills required for the post
(i) Ability to develop and apply computational methods to biological problems;
(ii) Experience with techniques such as machine learning or mathematical modelling of biological datasets, for example in genomics or proteomics;
(iii) Evidence of original research and ability to publish in high impact journals.

Research expectations : The Fellow is expected to develop a collaborative research program with our academic partners.  We envisage that the Research Fellow will become a permanent staff member, supported by funding from successful research grant applications and developing new areas of teaching, especially at the post-graduate level. To ensure this, the two Schools will provide career training for the Fellow. The Fellow will have established collaborations with companies and successfully obtained co-funded industry-government projects. The Fellow will publish high-impact papers and be building a research team.

Description of the School(s): This Early Career Research Fellow will work with and receive support from the School of Life and Medical Sciences and the School of Computer Science.  The successful candidate can build on the strengths of both Schools and may combine experiment-based empirical research with data-based analysis.

Within the School of Life and Medical Sciences (http://www.herts.ac.uk/apply/schools-of-study/life-and-medical-sciences/research), the Centre for Agriculture, Food and Environmental Management (CAFEM) is a research and teaching collaboration with the Royal Veterinary College, Rothamsted Research and Oaklands College.  The Fellow will work with researchers in CAFEM who have experience with systems biology applicable to crop protection, combining experimental field and lab research with computational modelling.  Within the School of Computer Science, research in the Biocomputation Research Group (http://biocomputation.herts.ac.uk/) involves development of computational models to study biological systems and application of biologically-inspired machine learning algorithms for the analysis of "real-world" data.  Members of the Biocomputation Group analyse and simulate computational models at different levels of complexity and collaborate closely with leading experimentalists in the UK and abroad.

Informal enquiries are encouraged and should be made to Professor Bruce Fitt, Professor of Plant Pathology, email: b.fitt at herts.ac.uk / Tel + 44 (0)1707 284751 or Dr Volker Steuber, Reader in Biocomputation and Head of the Biocomputation Research Group, email:  v.steuber at herts.ac.uk / Tel: +44 (0)1707 284350

Applications should be made through http://www.herts.ac.uk/contact-us/jobs-and-vacancies/research-vacancies



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