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Position Overview

The Oakland University Institute for Data Science, in conjunction with scientists at the University of Michigan and Harvard, has recently formed a collaborative American Heart Association-funded Strategically Focused Research Network (https://newsroom.heart.org/news/researchers-awarded-15-million-to-study-inflammations-impact-on-heart-brain-health). This network focuses on the interrelated domains of heart and brain health and aims to bring participating researchers together to unravel the biological mechanisms that the heart and brain have in common, as well as how these organs signal to each other and impact clinical outcomes. Despite the recognized interconnectedness of these health areas, few, if any, platforms offer integrated research solutions in this space. The role of the Institute for Data Science is to provide a computational platform that will be the heart of data analytics for this research network.

Job Description

The selected candidate will focus on methods for analyzing diverse data types and integrating ’omics expression data, imaging data, and wearable sensors data. The data types included will range from patient-specific to aggregated data, spanning the continuum of genetics, multi-omics, metabolomics, physiologic/wearable data, tissue, organ, imaging data, and patient-specific longitudinal electronic health record (EHR) data, including relevant Social Determinates of Health (SDOH) and geospatially encoded demographic and health outcomes data.

Minimum Qualifications

• Recent PhD in computational Biology, Statistics, Computer Science or related field.
• Deep understanding of next generation sequencing data and bioinformatics algorithms.
• Provide best practices data analysis, including QC and visualization, employing common NGS pipelines such as RNA-seq, ChIP-seq, ATAC-seq, Methyl-seq, DNA-seq, and Microbiome Sequencing.
• Multi-omics analysis is often needed.
• Proven experience working in a Linux cluster environment.
• Experience in cloud environments is also a plus.
• Familiarity with analysis of Biobank data, human microbiome sequence data (16S rRNA, metagenomics) and/or multi-omics data (e.g. transcriptomics or metabolomic).
• Strong background in one or more of the following: pedigree analysis, machine learning, statistical methods, variant annotation and interpretation, Genome Wide Association Studies (GWAS), imaging analysis, and wearable sensor data analysis.
• Knowledge of general principles for regulatory compliance, including understanding of the NIH Security Best Practices for Controlled Access Data Subject to the NIH Genomic Data Sharing (GDS) Policy (aka dbGaP compliance).
• Experience with project management.

Oakland University Standard Language

Oakland University is a nationally recognized doctoral university of high research activity located on 1,443 acres of scenic land in the cities of Rochester Hills and Auburn Hills in Oakland County, Michigan. The University has 142 bachelor’s degree programs and 138 graduate degree and certificate programs. Academics include programs in the College of Arts and Sciences, School of Business Administration, School of Education and Human Services, School of Engineering and Computer Science, School of Health Sciences, School of Medicine and School of Nursing. As an anchor institution in southeastern Michigan, Oakland University is committed to building ongoing and collaborative relationships with the surrounding communities. Community and civic engagement enhances the lives of our students and has a positive impact on our broader community.