Job Description

Research Fellows (Computational Biologists) NTU Lee Kong Chian School of Medicine (LKCMedicine) and University of Edinburgh (UoE) are leading research-intensive Institutes of Higher Learning. Both Universities have dynamic research environments with many areas of complementary and overlapping activity. In particular, the Universities have large scale population health research programmes, coupled to well-established health data platforms, and advanced techniques in genomics. This includes the SG100K study of 100,000 Asian individuals in Singapore (hosted by LKCMedicine) and the Generation Scotland study of 24,000 people in Scotland. The two Universities are therefore well positioned to collaborate on population and genomic research to address non-communicable disease, taking advantage of the insights generated from epidemiological studies that straddle ethnic groups. We are currently recruiting Research Fellows (Computational Biologists) for this joint project collaboration. 1. Precision Medicine . Develop predictive models that improve identification of clinically important variants in genes of specific relevance to clinical care (e.g oncology, rare disease) in the Asian populations. 2. Cognitive Health. Provide new insight into the causal relationship between DNA methylation and cognitive decline in Alzheimer’s patients and identify population level commonalities and differences in that relationship. 3. Molecular epidemiology of skin disease . Improve our understanding of the role of genetic and epigenetic mechanisms in the development of atopic dermatitis, and provide new insights into the pathophysiology of atopic skin inflammation. Key responsibilities include but not limited to:

• Apply qualitative and quantitative research techniques which include accurate in-depth assessment, interpretation and evaluation of large-scale omics datasets, including next generation sequencing and arrays based data sets.
• Analyse pathogenic protein-coding mutations, using structural bioinformatics, molecular modelling and variant effect prediction to both identify disease-associated variants, and to understand their molecular mechanisms.
• Build databases containing the genomic datasets, write scripts to analyse the information in the dataset and queries to retrieve the information
• Imputation of missing data
• Present results within the research group, using appropriate presentations formats;
• Make a strong contribution to reporting study results, including writing up for publication in peer-reviewed journals and support grant applications
• Participate in seminars and work-in-progress meetings within the team and collaborators.
• Provide guidance and mentorship to junior researchers, undergraduate and graduate students, occasional educational and or instructional activities.

Skills and knowledge:

• Candidates should have at least a PhD in a related scientific area (eg Bioinformatics/Computational Biology/Life Sciences/Computer Sciences/Epidemiology/Public Health/Statistics).
• Experience with R/Python/Java or similar languages and with Unix based platforms
• Knowledge of next generation sequencing (genomics, bulk and/or single cell transcriptomics), population genetics, statistics, bioinformatics or high dimensional data analysis
• Demonstrated in-depth knowledge, skills and expertise, with capability of leadership and achieving research excellence

Hiring Institution: LKC In line with Singapore’s nationwide Vaccination-Differentiated Safe Management Measures (VDS), employees must be fully vaccinated to return to the workplace, unless certified to be medically ineligible. For Information on VDS, please click here .