Postdoctoral Research Associate

**About the role**



Comparative genomics, and specifically our ability to identify which genes are
related in different species, has revolutionized our understanding of the
natural world. It enables us to reconstruct the tree-of-life on Earth, it
allows us to reveal how biological function has evolved and is distributed on
this tree, and it is the foundation that enables us to use model organisms to
study health and disease. Accordingly, almost all of contemporary biological
science research is critically dependent on our ability to identify which
genes are related in different species. The Kelly lab has developed the
OrthoFinder comparative genomic methods. OrthoFinder has become widely-used in
comparative genomics research, it powers many popular databases of online
genomic information, and has enabled and been cited by over 6,000 studies in
the last five years. The Kelly lab is looking to appoint a Postdoctoral
Research Associate to work on the OrthoFinder project.





**About you**



The successful applicant will be responsible for developing and implementing
additional functionality in the OrthoFinder method. Specifically, the
successful applicant will focus on improving the usability and accessibility
of the method to enhance user ability to perform analyses in comparative
genomics, enable new analyses, and gain new evolutionary insights from data
generated using OrthoFinder. The successful applicant should have prior
experience in data analysis, data visualization, and preferably the
development of interactive web-applications through approaches such as Bokeh,
Shiny, Taipy, Streamlit etc. The successful applicant should be motivated and
excited by the opportunity to help advance the capabilities of comparative
genomic research community, and to use these tools to make new discoveries.





**How to apply**



The Kelly lab welcomes individuals with diverse career backgrounds – PhD-level
scientists in any discipline with expertise in data and programming, or
software engineers outside of academia looking to change career to biological
research are particularly welcome to apply.





Where Covid-19 has resulted in substantial disruption to your work or research
outputs, please explain this by providing an additional paragraph in your
supporting statement.





The University of Oxford is committed to equality and valuing diversity. All
applicants will be judged on merit, according to the selection criteria.





This post is full-time and fixed term for 3 years.





The role closes on Friday 4th July 2025 at 12 noon and interviews will be
scheduled for mid to late July.