Are you joining our team to strengthen FAIR data stewardship and analysis in Dutch life sciences research?
Are you experienced in data interoperability in life sciences research? Here is your chance to join our team and help build the capacity in FAIR-based data stewardship in the DTL and Health-RI network.
Towards a national FAIR-compliant data infrastructure for life sciences research
DTL and Health-RI are committed to establish a national data infrastructure and competence network for digital life sciences research and innovation in the Netherlands. We form a coordinating data expertise and support centre to enable public and private organisations in the field to optimise (re)use and interoperability of research data. In the health domain this includes access to data in healthcare/clinical data, while access to molecular/biological data is crucial to foster research in the biosciences domain. Goal is to facilitate the broad implementation of best practices in data-intensive life sciences research at institutional, national and international level and to help strengthen reproducible research outputs in line with FAIR-based Open Science policies.
We offer you an interesting environment to work across various life science and technology domains, bringing the FAIR data principles into daily practice of the researcher. Here, we work closely with all major players in the national research data landscape. You will not perform your own research, but help us to support our network of partner organisations in the life sciences to work on the common challenges in FAIR data stewardship and data analysis. We address a broad range of technologies in our activities, covering “~omics” and bioimaging, as well as bioinformatics and A.I., integrated into distributed data access and concepts such as the Personal Health Train for FAIR-based federated analysis and learning.
Your role
You will be working in our DTL Projects team, which is involved in a variety of national and international initiatives and projects related to digital life sciences.
Roughly half of your time you will be working as part of the Health-RI core team developing the national health data infrastructure. You will be part of the Health-RI architecture board to jointly design the outline of the national health data infrastructure. Your role will also be to advise and assist Health-RI’s regional node teams associated with the major Dutch health research institutes to set up their FAIR-compliant data processes, and to help build the capacity in these organisations to implement FAIR data stewardship and FAIR-based analysis approaches in health research. For example, we are currently assisting the UMCs, hospitals and universities in making COVID-19 patient data FAIR to support multi-centric studies and making these data reusable for future research. Health-RI realises a FAIR-based national COVID-19 (meta)data portal to facilitate the data search and access process. These activities are exemplary to the development of Health-RI into a national data infrastructure for health research, supporting Dutch health and disease fields. Health-RI has just acquired national funds that will help to realise this infrastructure. You will work closely together with data stewards and data scientists in UMCs, hospitals, universities, institutes and companies and help consolidate advanced expertise within these organisations, by helping to develop and deliver training where needed.
The other half of your time you will be working in national and international projects, for instance ELIXIR-Converge, FAIRsFAIR and EJP Rare Diseases, where new approaches to FAIR implementation are being developed, tested and consolidated for broader use across the life sciences. This will result in new guidelines, standards, training, tools and services to support the data stewards and data scientists in the DTL- and Health-RI-associated organisations.
In your new position you will complement the expertise base and capacity of our team in FAIR-based data stewardship and analysis, and help to strengthen the Dutch involvement in European research infrastructures ELIXIR and BBMRI, as well as in the European Open Science Cloud. You will help to professionalise the emerging field of data stewardship as an integral part of digital life sciences. With your expertise in data interoperability you help to build a strong FAIR service portfolio and health data infrastructure for the broader life sciences research, including relevant components in our training programme.
Your profile
You have demonstrable expertise in data interoperability and/or bioinformatics in a life science research setting, and you have affinity with data support, covering aspects in data stewardship/ research data management. You preferably have a PhD in a life science subject that fits the scope of DTL’s / Health-RI’s field of work. You have a desire to share your expertise, e.g. by demonstrable experience in developing and delivering training, and you have strong communication skills (fluent Dutch and English, also in writing). You like to innovate and are able to translate concepts to a practice of the daily work of a researcher or a data steward. As a team player, you have a pragmatic attitude and a conceptual mind and like to take initiative. You take pride in enabling life sciences and health research.
We offer
You will be appointed at DTL Projects, offering a flexible working environment. We offer you a role in our team that leaves ample room for your personal growth, embedded in a national and international expert network. Our office in Utrecht serves as your basis, where we usually convene as a team on a regular basis. Of course, in the pandemic, all of us are working from home, and we collaborate using online tools. In general, working from home for part of your time is a natural practice in our organisation. For your projects you will also travel to meet and work with our partner groups across the life sciences and health domain.
We offer you a 0.8 – 1.0 fte appointment for initially 1 year, with the intention to extend this as a permanent position. DTL Projects has a 38 hour working week and participates in the ABP pension fund. Gross salary level is €3.746 – €5.826 per month, VSNU Scale 11-12, depending on your education and work experience. In addition you will receive 8% holiday allowance and 8% end-year bonus, following the labour agreement of the Dutch universities.
Please send your motivation letter and curriculum vitae to andrea.wesdorp[at]dtls.nl before May 31, 2021. For more information, please contact ruben.kok[at]dtls.nl or rob.hooft[at]dtls.nl.
About DTL/DTL Projects
DTL, the Dutch Techcentre for Life Sciences is a public-private partnership of 50+ organisations in the Netherlands that establish a digital life sciences platform. DTL partners exchange expertise and work on shared solutions for advanced data analysis and data stewardship, and for development and access to advanced technologies and infrastructures. Building on each other’s expertise and methodology is a great value in DTL: we strive to facilitate – where feasible – collaboration among life scientists, technology and data experts and trainers on topics that surpass the capacity of individual groups. Within the framework of the DTL network, a separate projects organisation supports collaborative projects that fit the scope of DTL. The DTL Projects Foundation (Stichting DTL Projects) establishes and supports collaborative multi-party projects. DTL Projects also supports Health-RI in realising the national health data research infrastructure.
About Health-RI
Health-RI is a Dutch non-profit foundation supporting a growing network of organisations to realise a national health data infrastructure for biomedical and health research and innovation. Health-RI has recently acquired significant government funding to help establish a coordinated national data expertise and infrastructure network of FAIR-compliant regional nodes of organisations in healthcare and health research. Health-RI’s mission is to build an integrated health data research infrastructure accessible for researchers, citizens and care providers. The Health-RI team facilitates and fosters the optimal use of knowledge, tools, facilities, health data and samples to enable data driven health research and to accelerate sustainable and affordable personalized medicine and health.
DTL, DTL Projects and Health RI combine their offices close to Utrecht Central Station, at the Jaarbeurs Innovation Mile (JIM), Jaarbeursplein 6 Utrecht.
Weblinks
DTL: www.dtls.nl
Health-RI: https://www.health-ri.nl/
FAIR: https://www.dtls.nl/fair-data/ and https://www.go-fair.org
ELIXIR: http://www.elixir-europe.org