Position Title: | Technical Officer for Bioinformatics |
Nature of the Position: | Regular/Full time |
Job Type: | Seconded to Africa CDC |
Reports to: | Portfolio Lead |
ASLM background
The African Society for Laboratory Medicine (ASLM) is a pan-African professional body working to advocate for the critical role and needs of laboratory medicine and networks throughout Africa. Africa is rapidly growing but faces major health challenges including epidemics of HIV, tuberculosis, and malaria, and new priorities such as Ebola and other global health security threats. Strengthened laboratory capacity and surveillance in Africa are critical to overcoming the burden of disease and ensuring a healthy future for the continent. ASLM addresses these challenges by working collaboratively with governments, local and international organizations, implementing partners, and the private sector.
Africa CDC background
The Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (Africa CDC) was officially launched in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, on January 31, 2017. As Africa’s first continent-wide public health agency, it aims to create a safer, healthier, integrated, and stronger Africa. The vision is for Member States to effectively respond to infectious disease outbreaks and other public health threats. The agency’s mission is to enhance the capabilities of Africa’s public health institutions to swiftly and effectively detect and respond to disease outbreaks and other health challenges. This is achieved through a coordinated network of continent-wide preparedness and response, surveillance, laboratory, and research programs. Strengthening laboratory network systems and integrated disease surveillance are central to the Africa CDC’s mandate.
Purpose of the role
The Bioinformatics Technical Officer (Pathogen Genomics and Partnerships) will provide scientific, operational, and technical assistance to the Program Lead of Africa CDC Institute of Pathogen Genomics (IPG) on the implementation of laboratory molecular diagnostic assays and basic bioinformatics applications training. The technical officer will aid with technical support in bioinformatics and help implement adaptation of these applications for public health decision making in Africa.
He/she will also work together with other divisions within the Africa CDC, stakeholders, funding and implementation partners, and Member States to build and advance public health pathogen genomics in National Public Health Institutes in Africa. This position reports to the Program lead, Genomics for Pathogen Genomics
Major Duties and Responsibilities
The Bioinformatics Officer for Pathogen Genomics and Partnerships shall:
- Assist National Public Health Institutes in Africa and the Head of Division of Laboratory Systems and Networks with public health genomics and partnerships
- Aid the laboratory division and the Africa CDC Institute of Pathogen Genomics in implementing the Africa Pathogen Genomics Initiative (Africa PGI) data platform continent-wide via the Africa CDC Regional Integrated Surveillance and Laboratory Networks (RISLNET), in close collaboration with Regional Collaborating Centres (RCCs)
- Provide bioinformatics expertise for developing and executing pathogen genomics projects, ensuring scientific soundness and technical feasibility
- Guide bioinformatics and data platform policies, programmatic activities, and operations for the Africa PGI data architecture, focusing specifically on bacterial pathogens
- Develop and conduct training sessions on basic bioinformatics applications relevant to pathogen genomics
- Aid in integrating pathogen genomics into public health decision-making processes.
- Work with National Public Health Institutions to ensure accurate and timely analysis of genomic data
- Collaborate with other divisions within the Africa CDC to ensure cohesive and coordinated efforts in bacterial genomics
- Engage with stakeholders, funding and implementation partners, and Member States to promote and advance public health bacterial genomics initiatives
- Assist in building capacity within National Public Health Institutes in Africa for pathogen genomics
- Manage and analyze pathogen genomic data to support public health surveillance and response
- Use bioinformatics tools to interpret genomic data and provide actionable insights.
- Contribute to research projects focused on pathogen genomics and their public health impacts
- Stay updated with the latest advancements in pathogen genomics and incorporate relevant findings into program activities
- Prepare reports and documentation related to pathogen genomics and public health impacts
- Maintain accurate records of technical assistance provided to countries and outcomes achieved
- Perform other duties as assigned by the Program lead.
Qualification:
- .Master’s degree in either bioinformatics, biological science, or computational bioinformatics OR programming from an accredited academic institution with at least 3 years of relevant professional work experience
- Experience of working in a public health setting is an added advantage.Excellent working knowledge of bioinformatics methods, databases, data structures, and applications programming
- Good knowledge of modern biology and applicable field of research
- Interpersonal skills to work with both technical and non-technical personnel at various levels in a multi-cultural organization
- Strong troubleshooting skills and proven resourcefulness in researching solutions to technical problems
- Hands-on knowledge of computer systems, security, network and systems administration, and data storage systems
- Cross-cultural competency: ability to work with a diverse, continental and global team
- Experience with cloud computing, distributed computing and/or bioinformatic workflow languages required.
- Knowledge of genomic sequencing, relevant bioinformatics tools (aligners, variant callers, etc) and working with public sequencing databases such as GISAID, and GenBank
- Strong practical experience with UNIX command line environments and ability to code in at least two languages of Python, and R
- Experience with bacterial genomics and other pathogen analysis and handling large volumes of data in complex bioinformatics workflows.
- Experience with building bacterial and other pathogen analysis pipelines and products from scratch
- Experience in life sciences or healthcare with research questions, data mining, user experience design, metadata curation, or making data FAIR
Tenure of appointment
The appointment will be made on a fixed term contract, of which the first three months will be considered as a probationary period. Thereafter, the contract will be renewed annually subject to satisfactory performance and availability of funding.
Equal opportunity
ASLM is an equal opportunity employer and selects its employees based solely on their skills and qualifications for their job. All qualified candidates are invited to apply.
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