Job Reference
183_25_LS_INB_RE3
Position
Senior Research Engineer on Federated Analysis and Learning Infrastructures (RE3)
Closing Date
Monday, 10 March, 2025
Reference: 183_25_LS_INB_RE3
Job title: Senior Research Engineer on Federated Analysis and Learning Infrastructures (RE3)
About BSC
The Barcelona Supercomputing Center - Centro Nacional de Supercomputación (BSC-CNS) is the leading supercomputing center in Spain. It houses MareNostrum, one of the most powerful supercomputers in Europe, was a founding and hosting member of the former European HPC infrastructure PRACE (Partnership for Advanced Computing in Europe), and is now hosting entity for EuroHPC JU, the Joint Undertaking that leads large-scale investments and HPC provision in Europe. The mission of BSC is to research, develop and manage information technologies in order to facilitate scientific progress. BSC combines HPC service provision and R&D into both computer and computational science (life, earth and engineering sciences) under one roof, and currently has over 1000 staff from 60 countries.
Look at the BSC experience:
BSC-CNS YouTube Channel
Let's stay connected with BSC Folks!
We are particularly interested for this role in the strengths and lived experiences of women and underrepresented groups to help us avoid perpetuating biases and oversights in science and IT research. In instances of equal merit, the incorporation of the under-represented sex will be favoured.
We promote Equity, Diversity and Inclusion, fostering an environment where each and every one of us is appreciated for who we are, regardless of our differences.
If you consider that you do not meet all the requirements, we encourage you to continue applying for the job offer. We value diversity of experiences and skills, and you could bring unique perspectives to our team.
Look at the BSC experience:
BSC-CNS YouTube Channel
Let's stay connected with BSC Folks!
We are particularly interested for this role in the strengths and lived experiences of women and underrepresented groups to help us avoid perpetuating biases and oversights in science and IT research. In instances of equal merit, the incorporation of the under-represented sex will be favoured.
We promote Equity, Diversity and Inclusion, fostering an environment where each and every one of us is appreciated for who we are, regardless of our differences.
If you consider that you do not meet all the requirements, we encourage you to continue applying for the job offer. We value diversity of experiences and skills, and you could bring unique perspectives to our team.
Context And Mission
ELIXIR (European Life Science Infrastructure for Biological Information) is a pan-European organization founded in 2014 which aims to integrate and harmonize European bioinformatics infrastructures. ELIXIR coordinates the participation of 23 countries, engages with other strategic European initiatives and projects, e.g. ESFRI, Research Data Alliance, EUDat, EGI; promotes specific training activities and workshops on ELIXIR resources, partners with industry; and play a key role in shaping the bioinformatics landscape. Spain has been a member of ELIXIR since 2015, with the INB (Spanish National Bioinformatics Institute) as the Spanish national node. Within ELIXIR, the INB is responsible for the bioinformatics infrastructure offered by Spain and, therefore, should guarantee its alignment with the strategic areas implemented by ELIXIR.
Since 2018, the INB has two overarching objectives: deepen the alignment of its activities with ELIXIR, and increase the translational impact of INB actions towards the Spanish National Health System (SNS). For the latter objective, the INB has created and supports TransBioNet (Translational Bioinformatics Network), which aims to structure, bring together and work with bioinformatics groups in healthcare settings with a particular focus on the Health Research Institutes (IIS) recognized by the ISCIII. Since 2021, the INB has continued its activities in the context of IMPaCT-Data, the Data Science programme of IMPaCT. IMPaCT is the Spanish National Infrastructure for Personalized Medicine associated with Science and Technology by the National Health Research Institute Carlos III (ISCIII).
In 2022, the European Commission launched several flagship projects focused on using and re-using biomedical data to enable and accelerate research activities. In this context, the BSC participates in the European Genomic Infrastructure (GDI) and the EUropean federation for CAncer IMages (EUCAIM). The GDI project will enable access to genomic and related phenotypic and clinical data across Europe. It is doing that by establishing a federated, sustainable and secure infrastructure to access the available data. GDI builds on the outputs of the Beyond 1 Million Genomes (B1MG) project and is realising the ambition of the 1+Million Genomes (1+MG) initiative and represents the implementation phase of the overall ambition of enabling the use of genomics data for precision medicine. Regarding EUCAIM, it is the cornerstone of the European Commission-initiated European Cancer Imaging Initiative, a flagship of Europe’s Beating Cancer Plan (EBCP), which aims to foster innovation and deployment of digital technologies in cancer treatment and care to achieve more precise and faster clinical decision-making, diagnostics, treatment and predictive medicine for cancer patients. The ultimate goal is to deploy a pan-European digital federated infrastructure of FAIR cancer-related, de-identified, real-world images. The infrastructure is designed to preserve the data sovereignty of providers and provide a platform, including an Atlas of Cancer Images, for the for developing and benchmarking AI tools towards precision medicine. EUCAIM will address the fragmentation of existing cancer image repositories by building on repositories from the AI4HI initiative, European research infrastructures and national/regional repositories including clinical images, pathology, molecular and laboratory data.
Since 2018, the INB has two overarching objectives: deepen the alignment of its activities with ELIXIR, and increase the translational impact of INB actions towards the Spanish National Health System (SNS). For the latter objective, the INB has created and supports TransBioNet (Translational Bioinformatics Network), which aims to structure, bring together and work with bioinformatics groups in healthcare settings with a particular focus on the Health Research Institutes (IIS) recognized by the ISCIII. Since 2021, the INB has continued its activities in the context of IMPaCT-Data, the Data Science programme of IMPaCT. IMPaCT is the Spanish National Infrastructure for Personalized Medicine associated with Science and Technology by the National Health Research Institute Carlos III (ISCIII).
In 2022, the European Commission launched several flagship projects focused on using and re-using biomedical data to enable and accelerate research activities. In this context, the BSC participates in the European Genomic Infrastructure (GDI) and the EUropean federation for CAncer IMages (EUCAIM). The GDI project will enable access to genomic and related phenotypic and clinical data across Europe. It is doing that by establishing a federated, sustainable and secure infrastructure to access the available data. GDI builds on the outputs of the Beyond 1 Million Genomes (B1MG) project and is realising the ambition of the 1+Million Genomes (1+MG) initiative and represents the implementation phase of the overall ambition of enabling the use of genomics data for precision medicine. Regarding EUCAIM, it is the cornerstone of the European Commission-initiated European Cancer Imaging Initiative, a flagship of Europe’s Beating Cancer Plan (EBCP), which aims to foster innovation and deployment of digital technologies in cancer treatment and care to achieve more precise and faster clinical decision-making, diagnostics, treatment and predictive medicine for cancer patients. The ultimate goal is to deploy a pan-European digital federated infrastructure of FAIR cancer-related, de-identified, real-world images. The infrastructure is designed to preserve the data sovereignty of providers and provide a platform, including an Atlas of Cancer Images, for the for developing and benchmarking AI tools towards precision medicine. EUCAIM will address the fragmentation of existing cancer image repositories by building on repositories from the AI4HI initiative, European research infrastructures and national/regional repositories including clinical images, pathology, molecular and laboratory data.
Key Duties
- Development the high-level orchestration mechanism to enable federated analysis and learning experiments.
- Develop communication channels among partners for data sharing.
- Develop, document and maintain software for the integration and biological data, following the guidelines of ELIXIR. Maintain communication with ELIXIR platforms, communities, and management, participate in regular meetings and discussions.
- Contribute to supervise other members at the INB/ELIXIR-ES units at BSC.
Requirements
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Education
- BSc or MSc. in bioinformatics, computational biology or computer sciences with significant bioinformatics experience.
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Essential Knowledge and Professional Experience
- Over 5 years' experience in cloud computing and VREs.
- Over 5 years' experience in data management APIs.
- Over 5 years' experience in database design and management (SQL and noSQL).
- Over 5 years' experience in programming language ecosystems such as C++, Perl, Python, PHP and/or Java.
- Vast experience working with Unix/Linux systems.
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Additional Knowledge and Professional Experience
- Experience in the development, generation and use of software containers, e.g. Docker, Singularity and/or rkt, as well as their orchestration using docker-compose, Kubernetes, ansible and/or similar technologies.
- Experience on workflow managers such as Galaxy, Nextflow or similar.
- Experience on developing project technical specifications.
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Competences
- Ability of understand scientific literature, and software documentation.
- Ability to communicate scientific results.
- Ability to work independently.
- Ability to represent the team in international project meetings.
- Used to work under pressure under strict deadlines.
Conditions
- The position will be located at BSC within the Life Sciences Department
- We offer a full-time contract (37.5h/week), a good working environment, a highly stimulating environment with state-of-the-art infrastructure, flexible working hours, extensive training plan, restaurant tickets, private health insurance, support to the relocation procedures
- Duration: Open-ended contract due to technical and scientific activities linked to the project and budget duration
- Holidays: 23 paid vacation days plus 24th and 31st of December per our collective agreement
- Salary: we offer a competitive salary commensurate with the qualifications and experience of the candidate and according to the cost of living in Barcelona
- Starting date: 01/03/2025
Applications procedure and process
All applications must be submitted via the BSC website and contain:
- A full CV in English, including contact details.
- A cover/motivation letter with a statement of interest in English, clearly specifying for which specific area and topics the applicant wishes to be considered. Additionally, two references for further contacts must be included. Applications without this document will not be considered.
Development of the recruitment process
The selection will be carried out through a competitive examination system ("Concurso-Oposición"). The recruitment process consists of two phases:
- Curriculum Analysis: Evaluation of previous experience and/or scientific history, degree, training, and other professional information relevant to the position. - 40 points
- Interview phase: The highest-rated candidates at the curriculum level will be invited to the interview phase, conducted by the corresponding department and Human Resources. In this phase, technical competencies, knowledge, skills, and professional experience related to the position, as well as the required personal competencies, will be evaluated. - 60 points. A minimum of 30 points out of 60 must be obtained to be eligible for the position.
The recruitment panel will be composed of at least three people, ensuring at least 25% representation of women.
In accordance with OTM-R principles, a gender-balanced recruitment panel is formed for each vacancy at the beginning of the process. After reviewing the content of the applications, the panel will begin the interviews, with at least one technical and one administrative interview. At a minimum, a personality questionnaire as well as a technical exercise will be conducted during the process.
The panel will make a final decision, and all individuals who participated in the interview phase will receive feedback with details on the acceptance or rejection of their profile.
At BSC, we seek continuous improvement in our recruitment processes. For any suggestions or comments/complaints about our recruitment processes, please contact recruitment [at] bsc [dot] es.
For more information, please follow this link.
Deadline
The vacancy will remain open until a suitable candidate has been hired. Applications will be regularly reviewed and potential candidates will be contacted.
OTM-R principles for selection processes
BSC-CNS is committed to the principles of the Code of Conduct for the Recruitment of Researchers of the European Commission and the Open, Transparent and Merit-based Recruitment principles (OTM-R). This is applied for any potential candidate in all our processes, for example by creating gender-balanced recruitment panels and recognizing career breaks etc.
BSC-CNS is an equal opportunity employer committed to diversity and inclusion. We are pleased to consider all qualified applicants for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, age, disability or any other basis protected by applicable state or local law.
For more information follow this link
BSC-CNS is an equal opportunity employer committed to diversity and inclusion. We are pleased to consider all qualified applicants for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, age, disability or any other basis protected by applicable state or local law.
For more information follow this link