18 months Fixed Term to start December 2025, Full Time Monday to Friday
We are seeking a motivated and experienced Research Assistant to join an innovative, co-produced initiative aiming to make mental health omics data more harmonized, accessible, understandable, and useful to researchers, clinicians, industry, and people with lived experience. You will work closely with a multidisciplinary team including data engineers, clinicians, software developers, and lived experience experts to:
* Scope and integrate new datasets into a new web interface, focusing on mental health-relevant omics and real-world data.
* Contribute to the enhancement of the Open Targets Platform to better present psychiatry-relevant omics data and make it more accessible to diverse users.
* Collaborate with people with lived experience (PWLE) to co-develop an accessible 'second skin' for the interface, ensuring usability and inclusivity.
* Assist in data analysis, including harmonisation of large-scale datasets and exploration of biological and environmental associations.
* Contribute to academic outputs, including manuscripts for peer-reviewed journals and presentations at conferences.
This is a unique opportunity to gain experience in:
* Functional genomics and psychiatric epidemiology
* Clinical informatics and data harmonisation
* Co-production and participatory research methods
* Working within a cutting-edge UK-wide data infrastructure initiative
You will be based in the Department of Psychiatry at the Cambridge Biomedical Campus and will be part of the dynamic new Cambridge-Oxford BioMind Lab, led by Dr Mary-Ellen Lynall, with access to training courses, seminars, and mentoring opportunities. You will also work closely with Dr Ellen McDonagh's team at Open Targets / European Bioinformatics Institute.
The ideal candidate will have strong organisational and communication skills, experience working with data in either R or Python, a medical degree, experience in functional genomic analyses, and experience working with people with lived experience in a clinical or research context.
We would support the successful candidate in applying for admission to a PhD at the University of Cambridge, should they wish to do so alongside this role.
Equality, Diversity and Inclusion
The University actively supports equality, diversity and inclusion and encourages applications from all sections of society.
Salary and Benefits
£33,002 to £35,608 per annum
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