HMS - Postdoctoral Fellow in Biomedical Informatics; Park Lab

HMS - Postdoctoral Fellow in Biomedical Informatics (Park Lab)

Title:

HMS - Postdoctoral Fellow in Biomedical Informatics (Park Lab)

School:
Harvard Medical School

Department/Area:
Biomedical Informatics

Position Description

The candidate will have the opportunity to work with the Park Lab to develop an independent research project within the scope of the lab's research focus. In addition to carrying out research, the successful candidate will have the opportunity to apply for fellowship funding, contribute to the writing of grants and manuscripts, participate in teaching and mentoring of lab members as needed, and otherwise contribute to overall lab operations and collaborative environment.

We are looking for a highly skilled bioinformatics postdoctoral Research Fellow who specializes in researching, designing, developing, deploying, and maintaining scalable bioinformatics pipelines on cloud-based infrastructure. The Research Fellow will be responsible for the code base supporting the large‑scale genomic processing and analysis pipelines at the SMaHT Data Analysis Center that manages multi‑omic data (e.g., Illumina/Pac Bio/ONT Whole Genome Sequencing (WGS), RNA‑Seq).

The ideal candidate will have a deep understanding of next‑generation sequencing (NGS) data analysis, workflow automation, and cloud computing. This role will support research and production environments where reproducibility, scalability, and performance are critical.

The successful candidates will join a group of supportive, mission‑driven, and positively busy computational biologists and have an opportunity to collaborate with world‑class biologists in the Harvard Medical School area.

Basic Qualifications

An ideal candidate will have a PhD in computational biology/bioinformatics/statistics/CS or another quantitative field, as well as superb programming (Python, shell scripting) and communication skills.

Additional Qualifications

• Extensive experience with analysis of high‑throughput sequencing data and knowledge of bioinformatics tools for sequence alignment, variant calling, sequence data QC, etc.
• Proficiency in Docker for creating a reproducible execution environment and Workflow Description Language for orchestrating complex tasks.
• Strong understanding of AWS services (EC2, S3) or similar cloud platforms for compute and storage.
• Version Control & CI/CD:
  Git, automated testing, deployment workflows.
• Experience with Linux systems, HPC, and distributed computing environments.
• Knowledge of optimizing pipelines for large‑scale genomic projects.

Special Instructions

• CV
• Research summary of PhD work.
• Cover letter describing your interest in the lab and initial ideas for new research directions or projects you could undertake in the lab.
• A NOTE with the names and contact information for three people who have agreed to serve as a reference.

Expected Dates

Duration:
This is a one‑year term position from the date of hire, with the possibility of extension, contingent upon work performance, business need, and continued funding to support the position.

Salary and Benefits

This position is salaried and benefits eligible. Information regarding postdoctoral fellow salary, which is determined by the number of years post PhD, and benefits can be found at (Use the "Apply for this Job" box below)..

With this appointment, you are represented by the Harvard Academic Workers (HAW) – UAW for purposes of collective bargaining and matters affecting your compensation and working conditions.

Harvard has an equal employment opportunity policy that outlines our commitment to prohibiting discrimination on the basis of race, sex, ethnicity, color, national origin, religion, disability, or any other characteristic protected by law or identified in the university's non‑discrimination policy.

Harvard University is committed to equal opportunity and non‑discrimination. We seek talent from all parts of society and the world, and we strive to ensure everyone at Harvard thrives. Our differences help our community advance Harvard’s academic purposes.

Harvard has an equal employment opportunity policy that outlines our commitment to prohibiting discrimination on the basis of race, ethnicity, color, national origin, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, veteran status, religion, disability, or any other characteristic protected by law or identified in the university’s non‑discrimination policy. Harvard’s equal employment opportunity policy and non‑discrimination policy help all community members participate fully in work and campus life free from harassment and discrimination.

Required fields are indicated with an asterisk (*).