About the position

These positions are for three years (with possibilities for extension) and are financed by the Norwegian Research Council and will be affiliated to the ELIXIR Norway team at the Department of Biosciences (IBV), University of Oslo (UiO). ELIXIR Norway is the Norwegian national infrastructure for bioinformatics which has funding from the Research Council of Norway. ELIXIR Norway is part of the pan-European infrastructure for bioinformatics, ELIXIR Europe, which has headquarters at the European Bioinformatics Institute, EBI in Hinxton, near Cambridge. The ELIXIR Oslo team has 10 employees and is part of BiLS (Bioinformatics in Life Sciences), the bioinformatics community at UiO.

Work at ELIXIR Oslo is in particular focused on genomic data and other data types related to genes and proteins. Several projects deal with sensitive human data related to health and disease, while others deal with data related to a variation of species in the biodiversity and pathogen domain. ELIXIR Oslo, together with the other partners, are developing and maintaining systems that allow users to share, find and reuse life science data according to the FAIR principles (Findable, Accessible, Reusable, and Interoperable).

You will work with

• Contribute to development/adoption of evolving community standards/recommendations for FAIR research data in life science, in the context of Research Data Alliance (RDA), Global Alliance for Genomics and Health (GA4GH), and ELIXIR. 
• Development of Omnipy, a type-driven Python library for data conversion, parsing and wrangling; tool and web service interoperability; and scalable dataflow orchestration. Work tasks will include development/documentation and maintenance of core functionality, as well as development of pipelines for transformation and harmonisation of various data sources, and integrations with other software solutions in the context of data analysis/AI in life science research.
• Architecture and development of novel solutions for orchestrating secure access to encrypted data in Galaxy, a popular, open source Virtual Research Environment (VRE). In particular, development of recryption services based on the GA4GH Crypt4GH standard, integrating with Galaxy as well as solutions for secure and trusted exchange of encryption keys. This development is part of a collaboration in the ELIXIR context, which also includes core European data resources for sensitive genomic data: the European Phenome/Genome Archive (EGA) and Federated EGA Norway.
• VueJS-based development of front-end functionality in Galaxy, and/or standalone webpages and services.
• Development and maintenance of new and legacy services according to local or national needs in the context of ELIXIR Norway. This will include some limited DevOps-related work in addition to programming tasks.
• Specific work tasks will be distributed based on competence and available resources.

Qualifications

Required qualifications:

• Master’s degree in computer science or equivalent. Long relevant practical experience from software and system development may compensate for not meeting the formal edu-cation requirements. 
• Applicants must be proficient in both written and oral English. 
• Software development experience, preferably full-stack. Software backend development experience in Python is required. Experience and interest in Object Oriented Program-ming.
• Being a Pragmatic Programmer, experience in Test-Driven Development (TDD) or other Agile methodologies, Open Source development experience, including git/GitHub-based version control, participation in Open Source communities, code contribution, etc.
• Experience with DevOps solutions, such as continuous integration and deployment, soft-ware dependency management, etc.

Desired qualifications:

• Development experience with Javascript/VueJS and/or Java is a plus.
• Experience with Linux and basic system administration
• Working experience with containers, such as Docker (building and management).
• Experience and interest in Design Patterns, algorithms and systems architecture. Interest in functional programming and other programming paradigms is also relevant.
• ETL, data wrangling and data analytics
• Competence in mathematics/statistics/bioinformatics and/or biology is not required, but is advantageous.

Personal skills

• Excellent problem-solving capabilities.
• Must be able to work independently in a structured and self-driven manner and demonstrate good collaborative skills in a cross disciplinary team.
• Motivated in working in an academic setting with development and deployment of infra-structure and software, supporting Life Science research activities.
• Motivation to learn and make use of various cutting-edge technologies is important.
• Personal and relational qualities will be emphasized. 

We offer

• Exciting and meaningful tasks in an organization with an important societal mission, contributing to knowledge development, education, and enlightenment that promote sustainable, fair, and knowledge-based societal development.
• A pleasant and stimulating work environment.
• Good welfare schemes.
• Opportunity of up to 1.5 hours a week of exercise during working hours.
• A workplace with good development and career opportunities. 
• Membership in the Statens Pensjonskasse, which is one of Norway's best pension schemes with beneficial mortgages and good insurance schemes.
• Salary in position as job Senior Engineer, position code 1181 in salary range NOK from 650 000 - 760 000, depending on competence and experience. From the salary, 2 percent is deducted in statutory contributions to the State Pension Fund.

Read more about the benefits of working in the public sector at Employer Portal.

Inclusive worklife and diversity at UiO

Inclusion and diversity are a strength. The University of Oslo has a personnel policy objective of achieving a balanced gender composition. Furthermore, we want employees with diverse professional expertise, life experience and perspectives.

If there are qualified applicants with disabilities, employment gaps or immigrant background, we will invite at least one applicant from each of these categories to an interview.

We hope that you will apply for the position. 

How to apply 

Your application should include:

• Application letter.
• CV (complete overview of education and work experience)
• Copies of educational certificates, transcript of records and letters for recommendation
• Names and contact details of 2-3 references (names, relation to candidate and telephone number)

Application with attachments must be submitted via our recruitment system Jobbnorge, click "Apply for the position".

When applying for the position, we ask you to retrieve your education results from Vitnemålsportalen.no. If your education results are not available through Vitnemålsportalen, we ask you to upload copies of your transcripts or grades. Please note that all documentation must be in English or a Scandinavian language.

General information

The best qualified candidates will invited for interviews.

Applicant lists can be published in accordance with Norwegian Freedom of Information Act § 25. When you apply for a position with us, your name will appear on the public applicant list. It is possible to request to be excluded from this list. You must justify why you want an exemption from publication and we will then decide whether we can grant your request. If we cannot, you will hear from us.

Questions about the position

For questions about the position, please contact: 

• Professor Rein Aasland, +47 92425456, email: rein.aasland@ibv.uio.no
• Senior Engineer Sveinung Gundersen, +47 93009454, email: sveinung.gundersen@ibv.uio.no
• Prof. emeritus Eivind Hovig, +47 93069881, email: ehovig@uio.no

For questions regarding the recruitment system, please contact:

• HR Adviser Nina Holtan, +47 22854424, email: nina.holtan@mn.uio.no

Apply for the position