Senior Statistical Scientist

Job Function Summary:

Involves developing and utilizing computational tools and systems to analyze and interpret biological or other research data. Utilizes and develops algorithms, computational techniques, and statistical methodologies. Helps in the design of new experiments. Implements end-user needs in database searching and integration. Maintains the computational infrastructure and tracks the flow of samples and information for large-scale studies. Provides web-based bioinformatics and access to public and proprietary databases.
 

Custom Scope:

The Division of Geriatrics seeks to recruit a full-time Senior Statistical Scientist who is a highly specialized bioinformatics programming professional with an expert understanding of statistical science and computational methods, recognized organization-wide as the key quantitative expert for a portfolio of multiple research projects of critical importance to the organization. These projects carry substantial consequences of success or failure, as findings and developed tools are used by patients, providers, and researchers across institutions to advance the health of older adults. The candidate is considered a subject-matter expert within the organization and is often recognized externally in the field. The project scope is broad and may extend beyond the university, and the analysis of situations or data requirements may have little or no precedent. The candidate will collaborate with Principal Investigators in the Division of Geriatrics, as well as outside of the Division, as a key scientific team member. The candidate will apply and develop expert-level algorithms, computational techniques, and statistical methodologies for cutting-edge medical solutions, including problems with little or no precedent.

The Senior Statistical Scientist will work with a group of collegial, innovative, and productive epidemiology and health outcomes researchers and clinicians at the University of California, San Francisco, who are focused on improving the health of older persons. The Division of Geriatrics highly values mutual respect and collegiality, and the Senior Statistical Scientist is an essential and highly respected part of our team. The candidate will provide consultation to research teams and national or external collaborators with an expert knowledge of highly complex statistical methods, and will advise investigators on appropriate statistical methods and interpretation of statistics. They will develop and implement computational algorithms and software for novel analyses of the most complex medical and survey data, setting and leading system standards for analysis algorithms, tools, and infrastructure with organization-wide and external impact. They will also lead and coordinate manuscripts, with particular input on advanced computational techniques and statistical methodologies, and will present them at national and international conferences as a recognized subject-matter expert. The candidate leads a team of statisticians and bioinformatics programming professionals in identifying and resolving highly complex issues without precedent, meeting project deadlines, and advancing the team’s capabilities.

Operationally, the candidate’s duties include: working with large, complex databases — including the Health and Retirement Study and Medicare-linked datasets — to derive analytic datasets; formulating extremely sensitive or complex logic for new systems and determining optimal statistical approaches for testing research hypotheses; developing and implementing computational algorithms and software for novel analyses of the most complex medical data; performing extremely complex data modeling and developing, evaluating, and maintaining highly complex analytic systems and algorithms that integrate and link across multiple large-scale databases, including the Health and Retirement Study and Medicare, for a variety of internal and external constituents with broad scope and impact; writing first-author manuscripts for peer-reviewed journals and conference proceedings on advanced computational techniques and statistical methodologies; presenting work on complex statistical modeling and computational tools at national and international conferences; conducting expert-level statistical analyses including competing-risks survival regression, Cox proportional hazards model, mixed-effects model, joint model, and linear and logistic regressions using SAS, STATA, and R software; developing and maintaining well-documented software and algorithms for data manipulation and analysis, setting and leading system standards for analysis tools and infrastructure used by statisticians organization-wide and at external institutions; generating and maintaining analytic datasets from large-scale survey data and Medicare datasets used in multiple research projects; overseeing expert support for users and researchers worldwide in the use of large-scale Health and Retirement Study data and Medicare-linked data, including through the NIH Linkage Enclave and the HRS public repository; leading a team of statisticians and bioinformatics programming professionals in identifying and resolving highly complex issues and software bugs in the analysis of complex data, drawing on expert-level knowledge to address unique problems without precedent; providing expert statistical consultation for geriatrics fellows and junior faculty; meeting project deadlines and demonstrating highly developed problem-solving skills across multiple concurrent research projects; coordinating development of documentation and presentations with researchers, scientists, and other project team members; maintaining the computational infrastructure and data flow for large-scale studies, providing expert support to researchers within secure computing environments including the NIH Linkage Enclave; influencing organizational policy and program development in data science and research computing, including through board-level engagement with the NIH Linkage Enclave; and performing other duties as assigned.

Budgeted Job Salary Range: 150K-200K