Basic Function:

Teagasc seeks to recruit a Research Officer to a Research Ireland funded position. The successful candidate will have experience in the analysis of shotgun microbiome data, including generating taxonomic, functional and diversity related outputs using assembly-based and assembly-free approaches. The successful applicant will also need to correlate this data with other omics and meta-data.

Background:

Research Ireland has funded the project entitled “PREterm birth Prevention with Oral Probiotics: A Double-Blinded Placebo Controlled Randomized Controlled Trial on Lactobacillus-crispatus-Containing Probiotic Therapy in Women at Risk of Preterm Birth (The PrePOP Study)”. PrePOP is led by University College Dublin through Professor Fionnuala McAuliffe in collaboration with Teagasc and Imperial College London, with input from collaborators at the University of Glasgow and University of Adelaide.  The Teagasc component of the project, led by Prof Paul Cotter, is focused on the analysis of microbiome data, generated through shotgun metagenomic sequencing. Teagasc are recruiting a bioinformatican to lead this analysis. The McAuliffe and Cotter teams have worked together over several years to study the microbiomes of mothers and infants, most notably through the MicrobeMom consortium, leading to several impactful papers and findings.

• Characterise the microbial communities in the maternal vagina and gut samples using shotgun metagenomics sequencing
• Identify changes in community composition, functional potential and diversity
• Characterise the abundance of Lactobacillus crispatus and the diversity of other Lactobacillus strains in the vaginal microbiome
• Perform strain tracking of the administered probiotic
• To assist Teagasc in meeting the commitments of the Quality Customer Service Charter and Action Plan.
• To actively participate in the annual business planning and Performance Management Development System (PMDS) processes.
• Fully co-operate with the provisions made for ensuring the health, safety and welfare of themselves, fellow staff and non-Teagasc staff and co-operate with management in enabling Teagasc to comply with legal obligations. This includes full compliance with the responsibilities outlined in the Safety Statement.
• Any other duties as may be assigned from time to time

* This job specification is intended as a guide to the general range of duties and is intended to be neither definitive nor restrictive.  It will be reviewed from time to time with the post holder.

 Note:  The ‘essential’ qualifications, knowledge, skills and behavioural competencies outlined above are ‘must-have’ which will be used in the selection process.