• Work in Parkville, just a hop away from the CBD, Melbourne Zoo & Queen Victoria Markets
• Enjoy flexible working options
• Attractive salary $104,066 - $126,405 per annum + super
• 12-month full time contract

What’s in it for you?

• Maximise your pay through salary packaging including entertainment and novated leases
• Ongoing career development and training
• Access to generous purchased leave to support your work life balance
• Wonderful onsite facilities available including showers, changing rooms, free towels and bicycle sheds
• Subsidised coffee in our lively café Synapse
• We offer a generous paid parental leave program whether you are a birth or non-birthing parent as well as assisting the individual throughout their parenting lifecycle

The opportunity

The Infectious Diseases research group focuses on research to enhance the diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of infectious diseases in infants, children, and adults. We have a particular interest in infections that are important to child health worldwide such as tuberculosis and respiratory infections. Our laboratory research encompasses phenotyping and functional analysis of innate and cellular immunology, including the use of epigenetics and transcriptomics to explore vaccine and anti-pathogen responses, and mechanisms by which pathogens cause disease.

We are seeking a highly motivated and skilled post-doctoral bioinformatician to drive and shape the bioinformatics program within the Infectious Diseases research group. This will involve implementing, maintaining, and updating bioinformatics pipelines for the analysis of research data generated within the Infectious Diseases research program. Projects will include analyses into the factors that influence vaccine response and infectious disease susceptibility across the life-course, in addition to leading the bioinformatic analyses for two clinical trials.

The bioinformatician will work under the direct supervision and guidance of Group Leader Dr Nicole Messina, to consult on bioinformatics experimental design, use their expertise to develop bioinformatics workflows pertaining to genomics, transcriptomics and epigenomics, and perform analyses in collaboration with members of the Infectious Diseases research group. The role will also be co-mentored by the MCRI Bioinformatics group.

Your responsibilities include:

• Manages the laboratory -omics datasets
• Implements and maintains bioinformatics pipelines and workflows for the Infectious Diseases research group
• Liaises with IT and other Bioinformatics groups regarding best practice/common pipelines across the Institute and infrastructure requirements with a focus on continuous improvement
• Advises on bioinformatics experimental design and provide training and support in the use of bioinformatic analysis tools and data analysis for team members
• Assists and contributes to data and figure generation for research publications and new grant applications

About you

• PhD qualification in Bioinformatics, Computer Science, Data Science, Engineering or related discipline
• Strong background in statistics and/or application of statistics for data analysis
• Proficiency in R, Python, High Performance Computing, generation of web resources and data visualisation
• Experience performing processing, quality control and analysis of large -omics data sets, including handling metadata and cleaning raw data

Who we are

At Murdoch Children’s Research Institute, we share a powerful vision; to re-imagine the future of child health. We are the home to many life-changing scientific discoveries. We are renowned for our cutting-edge focus on early interventions, improved diagnosis, prevention, and development of potential cures. Our success is founded on a philosophy of collaboration through a multi-disciplinary approach to solving the toughest questions in child health. Murdoch Children’s is committed to creating a culture of inclusivity, equity and respect that celebrates and values the diverse backgrounds and experiences of our people. We strive to foster a positive working environment that is underpinned by equal opportunity for all and consideration for the diverse voices of our people and the communities we serve. Murdoch Children’s is a proud member of the Australian Network on Disability and is a committed subscriber to Science Australia Gender Equity (SAGE) and its principles.

For more information, please refer to the position description.

Any specific questions related to this position should be directed to Dr Nicole Messina on nicole.messina@mcri.edu.au using the subject line: Bioinformatician enquiry via EthicalJobs.

To be considered, applicants should submit:

• Cover letter
• Resume
• Responses to ‘selection criteria’ via the position description

Please submit your application in one combined pdf document.

We welcome all genders, ages, ethnicities, cultural backgrounds, abilities, religions and sexual orientations in our workplace and encourage talented people of any identity to apply to our vacancies. We will provide reasonable adjustments in our recruitment process and in the workplace, please contact the People Leader listed above if this is needed.

All applicants, please be aware that in line with the Murdoch Children’s and VCGS COVID-19 Vaccination Policy, all Murdoch Children’s and VCGS workers must be fully vaccinated (boosted), unless a valid medical exception applies.

Please note, we reserve the right to close the vacancy prior to the closing date once a sufficient number of applications have been received.

A position description is attached.