Bioinformatician (Microbiology)

The Virology Section is seeking a highly motivated bioinformatician to study the genetic features, diversity, and evolution of respiratory viruses and other viral agents from a bioinformatics perspective. This position has been updated to reflect a more senior role, requiring proven experience in viral genomics analysis and the development of bioinformatics pipelines.

Education and qualifications:

Required:

Academic background in biosciences, with a degree or master’s in Bioinformatics.
Fluency in Catalan, Spanish, and English (business level; official language certification would be an asset).

Experience and knowledge:

Required:

Proven experience in bioinformatics applied to viral genomics (minimum of 2 years).
Expertise in sequence analysis, interpretation, and visualization of NGS results (quality filtering, de novo assembly, reference mapping, variant calling, phylogenetic analyses).
Experience downloading and analysing publicly available -omics databases.
Advanced programming skills (including at least R, Python3, and bash) and proficiency in running programs from the command line.
Experience working with and developing databases (e.g., SQL, PL/SQL).
Written and oral communication skills in both computational and experimental areas.

Good management skills, including analytical, organizational, and time management.
Highly motivated, proactive, responsible, and well-organized, with strong teamwork skills.

Desired:

Experience in optimizing and parallelizing pipelines.
Experience working on remote servers.
Previous experience in genetic characterization of viruses.
Knowledge of viral genetics of respiratory agents and their role in pathogenesis.
Willingness to learn new skills.

Main responsibilities and duties:

Support ongoing bioinformatics work in the Virology Section.
Execute and, where possible, optimise existing pipelines.
Develop and apply bioinformatics methods to support multiple projects in the field of microbiology.
Assist in the development, implementation, and computational analysis of virus genomic data.
Design and maintain databases and sequence repositories.
Co-author publications within the context of a virology research group.
Collaborate on other projects within the microbiology research group.
Supervise junior staff and students.
Lead the design of new bioinformatics pipelines.
Participate in project management.

Labour conditions:

Full-time position: 40h/week.
Starting date: immediate.
Gross annual salary: 32.000 euros. Salary ranges are consistent with our Collective Agreement pay scale).
Contract: Technical and scientific activities contract linked to the project activities.

What can we offer?

Incorporation to Vall d’Hebron Research Institute (VHIR), a public sector institution that promotes and develops the biomedical research, innovation and teaching at Vall d'Hebron University Hospital (HUVH), the biggest hospital of Barcelona and the largest of Catalan Institute of Health (ICS).
A scientific environment of excellence, highly dynamic, where high-end biomedical projects are continuously developed.
Continuous learning and a wide range of responsibilities within a stimulating work environment.
Individual training opportunities.
Flexible working hours.
23 days of holidays + 9 personal days.
Flexible Remuneration Program (including dining checks, health insurance, transportation and more)
Corporate Benefits: platform through which you can obtain significant discounts on travel, culture, technology, gastronomy, sports... among many others.
Healthy Offering: choose from a variety of wellbeing focused activities to be the healthiest you.

Deadline to apply: 06-10-2025

VHIR embraces Equality and Diversity. As reflected in our values we work toward ensuring inclusion and equal opportunity in recruitment, hiring, training, and management for all staff within the organization, regardless of gender, civil status, family status, sexual orientation, gender identity and expression, religion, age, functional diversity or ethnicity.