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Senior Geneticist

Posting date:	10 October 2024
Salary:	£59,640 to £69,035 per year
Hours:	Full time
Closing date:	09 November 2024
Location:	EH9 3JG
Remote working:	On-site only
Company:	SRUC
Job type:	Contract
Job reference:	REQ0116-62309

Summary

About The Team:

The Animal and Veterinary Sciences Research Group plays a key role in helping the land-based sectors at home and abroad to meet the challenges of achieving greater food security while reducing the environmental impact of food and farming, in a changing climate. The group has particular strengths in science relevant to animal breeding, health and welfare, and will interact strongly on livestock systems research with new Future Farming Systems group.

The group includes both desk-based and experimental research on:

• Animal breeding and genomics
  
• Animal behaviour and welfare
  
• Disease systems
  
• Avian Sciences (based in Ayr)
  

  The Group will work closely with others involved in both systems and component level research within and out with SRUC.

  Edinburgh Genetic Evaluation Services (EGENES) is a discreet unit of 6 geneticists and programmers that provides UK national genetic and genomic evaluations for farmed livestock on behalf of AHDB, individual breed societies and other commercial customers. It is tightly integrated with the Animal Breeding and Genomics Team to ensure that research results are rapidly implemented by farmers and breeding companies. Researchers also benefit from professional data handling expertise available in EGENES. The entire 2 team constitutes around 10.

  The Opportunity:

  This is an opportunity to take a leading role in a team leading development of genetic and genomic evaluations in the UK. You will work closely with the livestock industry to identify tools and technologies to extract phenotypes from new sources of data such as milk mid infrared (MIR) spectral data, abattoir data and digital images. The successful candidate will work within an integrated group of 10 programmers and geneticists, 6 of which work within EGENES so application of new developments has a very short route to application. Genomic evaluations are widely adopted by the dairy sector, and developments are ongoing to implement improved methods to evaluate the ever-increasing pool of data within, and across breeds (e.g. single-step across breeds BLUP). The convergence of the beef and dairy industry in the UK is creating new and exciting avenues to utilise datasets together. Our work is varied and interesting, ranging from improving the extraction of existing phenotypes to researching new economically and societally important phenotypes predicted from multiple data sources. EGENES is an active member of Interbull and Interbeef. Every day is different in Animal Breeding and Genomics.

  We are seeking a geneticist based in Edinburgh who can play a major role in the Animal Breeding and Genomics Team working closely with the other geneticists (Professor Raph Mrode, Dr Samir Id Lahoucine, Professor Mike Coffey) and the animal breeding team to develop methodologies to evaluate animals better, quicker, more accurately and for a wider range of traits. The successful applicant will also work very closely with other members of the EGENES team employed by AHDB and managed by Marco Winters. The connection between AHDB, EGENES and the Animal Breeding and Genomics Team is seamless.

  A less experienced geneticist with the right approach and attitude may be considered, as may be a more flexible working location. It is expected that the candidate will also undertake necessary research to underpin practical application of developments in genetic evaluation methodologies including imputation strategies with very large datasets. We work with dairy and beef cattle, sheep, alpacas and have worked with salmon, dairy goats and pigs. We have hundreds of thousands of genotypes and hundreds of millions of animal records in our evaluations currently.

  Required Skills:

  • A post doctorate qualification in quantitative genetics with a very good component of genomic methodologies
    
  • A minimum of 3 years work experience in genetics
    
  • Genetic and genomic evaluation experience
    
  • Experience in estimating genetic parameters for quantitative traits
    
  • Excellent numerical and statistical powers
    
  • Large data handling experience
    
  • Programming experience and the ability to learn new languages
    
  • Good communication ability
    
  • Good analytical/problem solving skills
    
  • Excellent team player skills
    
  • Attention to detail
    

    Desirable Skills:

    • SQL Server experience
      
    • FORTRAN
      
    • Python
      
    • Scripting
      
    • Docker experience
      
    • Experience of using Linux OS
      
    • Project management
      

      Minimum Qualifications:

      The successful candidate will have a post doctorate qualification in quantitative genetics with a very good component of genomic methodologies (SCQF Level 12).

      For full person specification, please read the Job Particulars document.

      Eligibility for Sponsorship:

      For the purposes of sponsorship, this role may be eligible for sponsorship depending on candidate circumstances.

      Admin ref: ACF/EGEN/015/24

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