Postdoctoral Research Associate in Wearable Sensors

Description

Research Assistant / Associate, School of Engineering and Physical Sciences, Institute of Sensors, Signals and Systems

Grade and Salary: Grade 6 £ 31,236 - £36,636;
Grade 7 £ 37,694 - £47,389 (Grade depends on experience)

Contract details: Fixed term for 13 months, full time

Holiday Entitlement: 33 days annual leave plus 9 buildings closed days (and Christmas Eve when it falls on a weekday)

To make a leading contribution to PD-WATCH, a project funded through the Tay Health Tech Grand Challenge, focused on the development and clinical validation of a miniaturised, flexible wearable patch for continuous tremor monitoring in Parkinson’s disease. Working with Dr Anne Bernassau and Prof Marc Desmulliez, the PDRA will support hardware optimisation, data acquisition, machine-learning pipelines for tremor classification, and clinical validation in collaboration with NHS Lothian.

The successful candidate will contribute to experimental design, data analysis, the preparation of publications, and support management of this interdisciplinary project. For appointment at Grade 7, significant experience in the areas listed below is required. The PD-WATCH project aims to develop wearable-based tremor assessment tools that can capture tremor severity, tremor subtype, and medication response in real-world settings, supporting future integration into NHS remote monitoring pathways.

• Take a leading role in the planning and conduct of assigned research individually or jointly in accordance with the project deliverables and project strategy. This includes hardware refinement, tremor-signal acquisition, and algorithm development.
• Characterisation analysis and interpretation of tremor data, including maintenance of datasets, documentation, drafting technical reports and scientific publications.
• Establish and maintain your research profile in sensor systems, biomedical signal processing, wearable technologies, or related fields, through publications and research dissemination.
• Survey the research literature and environment, understand the research challenges associated with the project and subject area, and develop/implement a suitable research strategy.
• Presentation of work at international and national conferences, at internal and external seminars, colloquia and workshops to develop and enhance our research profile.
• Take a leading role in developing and maintaining collaborations with colleagues across the research group/School/College/University and broader community of academic and industrial partners.
• Take a leading role in team/group meetings/seminars/workshops and School research group activities to enhance the wider knowledge, outputs and culture of the School/College.
• Take the lead in the organisation, supervision, mentoring and training of undergraduate and/or postgraduate students and less experienced members of the project team to ensure their effective development.
• Perform administrative tasks related to the activities of the research group and School, including Budgets/Expenditure.
• Keep up to date with current knowledge and recent advances in the field/discipline.
• Engage in personal, professional and career development, to enhance both specialist and transferable skills in accordance with desired career trajectory.
• Undertake any other reasonable duties as required by the Head of School/Director of Research Institute.
• Contribute to the enhancement of the University’s international profile in line with the University Strategy.

• Take the lead in identifying and attracting new sources of independent and external research funding and researchers into this research area as opportunities permit to support future research.
• Present research findings at high-profile national and international conferences, seminars and meetings to raise the profile of the research group to enhance the research strength of the School.
• Make a leading contribution to the management of the team/project and sustain an enhanced level of academic outputs and profile.

These key tasks are not intended to be exhaustive but highlight a number of major tasks which the staff member…