[BioC] Statistical Position Supporting Systems Biology

[Max Kuhn]

Position:

Statistician in a systems biology team focused on metabolic disorders
such as diabetes and obesity.

The position is part of a statistics group supporting Pfizer global
research and development.


Role and Responsibilities:

The statistician will be an integral member of a systems biology team
which develops and/or uses computational and statistical approaches to
manage and derive knowledge of biological processes from large
biological datasets (e.g., expression profiling, and other ‘omics’
sets).  In this role, he/she will share accountability for achieving
team goals focused on:

* Drug target discovery
* Early biomarker discovery
* Pathway understanding and mechanistic insight

Teams will consist of computational biologists, geneticists,
statisticians and bioinformatics specialists.

These statistician positions are unique in requiring a substantial
working knowledge of biology.  This is necessary in order to
collaborate effectively with biologists in the design of appropriate
experiments that will effectively elucidate the biological processes
underpinning metabolic diseases.

The statisticians’ contributions to meeting team goals will come in
the areas of experimental design, data analysis and data
interpretation.   They will also include assessment of the quality of
external databases from a statistical perspective.


Requirements:

Minimum:

* M.S. or Ph.D. in Statistics or Biostatistics

* A minimum of two years statistical consulting experience in applying
statistics to the understanding of biological systems, preferably in a
laboratory science environment

* Strong initiative, excellent interpersonal and communication
(written and verbal) skills

* Understanding of inference and probability; competence in
contemporary linear modeling including mixed models, particularly
longitudinal models; nonlinear regression; and predictive modeling
(e.g. random forests, support vector machines).

* Solid understanding of experimental design particularly as it
applies to  experiments producing high dimensional data (e.g. gene
expression, proteomics and rtPCR)

* Strong computational skills in R, S-plus or SAS

* Biological knowledge including more than superficial understanding
of cell and molecular biology and genetics.

Preferred candidates will have:

* Formal training in, or thorough understanding of, human physiology
particularly metabolic systems and cardiovascular biology

* Additional computing skills in scripting languages, such as perl,
python, UNIX shell scripts or others.


To Apply:

Go to

   http://pfizer.com/careers/

and choose "Find a Career at Pfizer" on the left and click on "Apply".
This position can be found by searching for Job ID 937467.