Find The Best Job Vacancies in Various industry sectors 92992+ Job Vacancy

Job title – Bioinformatician

Profession- Data Analytics

Directorate – Data Operations

Full Time equivalent - 37.5 hours

No of Roles – 1

Contract Type – Permanent

Location – Home Working/Remote or London based

UKHSA offers hybrid working or home working for its employees – this means that whilst the role will be based in one of our UKHSA offices, there will be opportunities for an element of working from home. The balance between home and workplace working is to be agreed with the line manager, determined primarily by business need and in line with departmental policy. Some business travel will be required to other UKHSA offices. Please be aware that this role can only be worked from within the UK and not overseas. Relocation expenses are not available

Working Pattern – Full Time/Flexible Working / Hybrid Working

Grade & Salary – Grade SEO National banding £37,056 - £42,481 per annum. Inner London £40,876 - £45,998 per annum. Outer London - £38,967 - £44,240

New entrants to the Civil Service are expected to start on the minimum of the pay band.

The internal roles rules apply to existing Civil Servants, i.e. level transfers move on current salary or the pay range minimum, transfers on promotion move to new pay range minimum or receive 10% increase. Either case is determined by whichever is the highest.

This role is to be appointed under Civil Service Terms & Conditions. Full details on the T&C’s are found https://www.ukhsa.reed.com/.

Closing Date – 31/03/2023. 23:55pm. Unfortunately, late applications will not be considered

Interview Date – TBC Please note, these dates are subject to change.

Job Overview

We are looking for a Bioinformatician to work within the Data Operations Directorate. The Surveillance Systems and Bioinformatics Division within this space works across the organisation and with external partners to lead the design, development, maintenance and delivery of surveillance systems, with a focus on accessibility, interoperability and improving health security outcomes. The Division is also responsible for the provision of an informatics capability to support laboratory services and has oversight of the UKHSA bioinformatics function to support whole genome sequencing.

UKHSA’s immediate and most important priority is to continue the response to the COVID-19 pandemic. UKHSA is also in the process of building on the legacy of the COVID-19 response to ensure resilient and scalable infrastructure to secure the UK in the strongest position to protect the public from future threats to health.

The Bioinformatics Unit at the UK Health Security Agency provides computational pipelines for the processing of pathogen whole genome sequencing data, translating raw data into actionable results. Our results directly inform clinical and Public Health intervention. The successful applicant will directly contribute to the development and maintenance of state of the art bioinformatics software working on a number of high impact pathogens, like SARS-CoV2, mpox, MRSA and M. tuberculosis. UKHSA mission is challenging, innovative and in the spotlight. To achieve our objectives effectively and fairly, we commit to representing modern Britain and all its diversity. UKHSA recognises that diversity of background and life experience brings different insights, creates challenge, and encourages change and innovation. This in turn produces more accountable and trusted public services and better decisions; better because they are more attuned to the needs and interests of all our communities. Differences of thought and outlook are not only respected but expected. We want all our employees to feel that they can be themselves at work and that they are valued.

Data Operations

The UKHSA Data Operations Directorate provides strategic leadership and oversight for developing and managing a common and bespoke suite of performant, modern, secure, data and analytical tools, services, platforms and applications, ensuring access to high quality data and analytics services, internally and externally.

Job Description

The postholder will contribute across the broad scope of the unit’s NGS Service activities, from maintenance and support of existing pipelines to extension of their deployment to further computational architectures (distributed, cloud, local, remote, external).

• Be responsible for day-to-day running and maintenance of the software and computer systems delivering existing UKHSA Whole Genome Sequencing (WGS) pipelines.
• Be accountable in providing Team Leads with progress of work which in turn will feed in to reporting to the Unit Head and Assurance Board
• Be able to work autonomously and flag concerns accordingly that might impact the smooth running of the business
• Contribute to expanding deployment of existing WGS pipelines to additional computational platforms (on-prem and cloud)
• Support the identification and sharing of best bioinformatics practice.
• Keep your knowledge and technical skills current ensuring the best value for money is achieved
• Be able to report on deliverables to Team Leads and the wider organisation
• Accept responsibility for refactoring existing WGS software components
• Develop tested, validated, and versioned software components for WGS analyses, incorporate into and validate new WGS pipeline versions
• Influence decision makers to strive to improve quality and performance
• Build strong working relationships both internally and with external stakeholders
• Be able to support and guide Junior grades on complex or contentious matters
• Satisfy support requests logged through helpdesk
• Analyse data from projects to which you are assigned, accepting responsibility for generating reports within agreed timelines.
• Lead on the preparation of reports posters and publications arising from data. The processing of bacterial or viral whole genome sequencing data from Public Health relevant pathogens through our pipelines. Posters to be presented at Scientific conferences, publications are submitted to academic journals and reports for UKHSA internal stakeholders or project based collaborators.
• Represent UKHSA at internal, National, and international meetings.
• Work consistent with the Bioinformatics Unit quality management system, ISO and other accreditation standards; participate in quality audits to support the unit’s accredited service.
• Comply with safety and quality protocols and procedures at all times

Communication and key working relationships

The post holder will develop working relationships and communicate regularly with a wide range of individuals, clinical and non-clinical, internal and external too. This will require a high level of communication and influencing skills, disseminating complex technical information and an ability to communicate complex programmatic and IT issues to non-specialist groups in ‘layman’ terms. This will include.

Internal

• Substantial interactions with members of the Bioinformatics Team and the Central Sequencing Lab (CSL)
• Regular interactions with Laboratory scientists, embedded bioinformaticians and epidemiologists.
• Substantial interactions within DAS and with central IT (ICT) colleagues.

External

• Interaction with external scientific computing experts to deliver appropriate technologies through external cloud-based resource and utilising UKHSA computing infrastructure.

Interactions with collaborating centres (Oxford University, EBI) to deliver software process for analysing WGS data. In addition, a high level of drafting skills is crucial in this role along with the ability to assimilate data.

The Bioinformatics and Whole Genome Sequencing (WGS) Software Development unit is part of Data Analytical Sciences within UKHSA’s National Infection Service Division. The unit is globally pre-eminent in the design, construction, validation, and deployment of bioinformatics pipelines for the automated analysis of Whole Genome Sequence (WGS) data for human bacterial and viral pathogens. Our High-Performance Compute (HPC) cluster runs fully reproducible in-house pipelines for more than 20 bacterial and viral pathogens including SARSCOV2. We also provide support to The National TB unit and the 7 TB control boards by running a TB pipeline in collaboration with Oxford University. The Unit consists of 3 groups, respectively headed by Leads for In-House pipelines, for pipeline development, and for TB sequence service delivery. Contributions from members of each group are not constrained by group membership and are encouraged to be intra-group.

The postholder will contribute across the broad scope of the unit’s NGS Service activities, from maintenance and support of existing pipelines to extension of their deployment to further computational architectures (distributed, cloud, local, remote, external).

We pride ourselves as being an employer of choice, where Everyone Matters promoting equality of opportunity to actively encourage applications from everyone, including groups currently underrepresented in our workforce.

UKHSA ethos is to be an inclusive organisation for all our staff and stakeholders. To create, nurture and sustain an inclusive culture, where differences drive innovative solutions to meet the needs of our workforce and wider communities. We do this through celebrating and protecting differences by removing barriers and promoting equity and equality of opportunity for all.

Essential Criteria:

• Degree in Bioinformatics or a related life science.
• Postgraduate training in Bioinformatics
• Familiar with Linux/unix; proficient on the CLI
• Knowledge of Next Generation Sequencing technologies and associated bioinformatic analytical approaches.
• Experience of applying diverse bioinformatics tools, preferably to the analysis of microbial DNA
• Experience of developing, modifying, debugging code used for data analysis, preferably python
• Highly motivated, enthusiastic, and hard working
• Interested in the advancements of medical microbiology and genomics
• Problem solving skills and ability to respond to sudden unexpected demands
• Must be able to use initiative to identify and implement tested solutions with a view to process and service improvement
• Must have ability to anticipate and resolve problems before they arise
• Ability to analyse complex facts and situations, develop a range of options, make recommendations
• An understanding of and commitment to equality of opportunity and good working relationships.

Desirable Criteria:

• PhD in a relevant subject

• Experience of VCS systems (e.g. git) for software versioning and documentation
• Knowledge of software containerization (e.g. Docker, Singularity)
• Knowledge of PostgreSQL or similar RDBMS

We'll assess you against these behaviours during the selection process:

• Delivering at Pace
• Making Effective Decisions
• Changing and Improving
• Working Together

• Learning and development tailored to your role
• An environment with flexible working options
• A culture encouraging inclusion and diversity
• A Civil Service pension with an average employer contribution of 27%

Job contact :

Name :
sophie rigney
Email :
[email protected]

Recruitment team :

Email :
[email protected]