Bioinformatics Scientist

Overview

Rarebase is an early-stage biotechnology public benefit corporation based in Palo Alto, California working to advance personalized medicine for the thousands of genetic diseases that have no effective treatments. We operate at the intersection of technology and biology, collaborating closely with patient communities to ensure that drug discovery and development is aligned with our shared goals - to bring effective treatments to the clinic as quickly and safely as possible.

Our Function™ drug and target discovery platform integrates cellular modeling of disease with functional genomics, high throughput screening, high content imaging and computational biology to identify molecules that address the underlying biology of genetic diseases. To support Function’s rapid growth, we are building a next-generation automated lab and are recruiting a San Francisco Bay Area-based scientific and computational team to be intimately involved in its development.

Rarebase is backed by top-tier institutional investors, pharma and biotech angel investors, families personally affected by rare disease, and others that truly care about our mission to re-invent therapeutic development for genetic diseases. Our advisors are leaders in the biotech and genetic disease community.

The Opportunity

We’re looking for a Bioinformatics Scientist to support the development of Rarebase’s state-of-the-art functional genomics and high-content screening platform and assist in the design, execution and scale-up of drug compound screening assays for rare diseases, with a focus on developmental disorders.

The ideal candidate will have experience in the processing and analysis of next generation sequencing data (e.g., RNAseq, metabolomics, whole genome sequencing, ATACseq, DrugSeq). Experience with analyzing results of gene editing assays (CRISPRi screens, epigenetic modulation) a plus.

The individual in this role will work closely with the broader scientific team to build out the analysis pipeline that will support development of our work.

As an early member of Rarebase’s computational biology team, you will be joining a biotech startup that has long term stability but yet is very much in formation, providing many opportunities for significant growth and impact. You will also work alongside a multidisciplinary team and an outstanding team of scientists focused on conducting inventive and innovative science that will lead to the discovery of novel medicines.

What you’ll do

• Apply your expertise with bioinformatics pipelines to process NGS data

• Create novel pipelines and/or algorithms to identify optimal therapies

• Contribute creatively to the company’s strategy, helping drive new discovery for rare diseases

• Champion ideas for new approaches to handle high-dimensional, diverse data and identify trends

• Collaborate closely with the broader computational team including artificial intelligence experts, computer vision / image specialists and data engineers, and the science team (neuroscientists, high-throughput biologists, clinical design experts)

• Communicate data and scientific results to both internal and external audiences with a high degree of sophistication.

What you’ll bring

• PhD in Bioinformatics, Computational Biology, Bioengineering, Computer Science, or related disciplines

• 5+ years of hands-on experience working with statistics and bioinformatics methods in a clinical, academic or industrial setting

• Track record of developing and implementing novel data analysis pipelines

• Track record of preprocessing data (e.g., normalization, FDR) and statistical training for experimental designs

• Track record of versatile programming experience and tool design

• Experience programming in Python and ability to quickly learn new languages and tools

• Knowledgeable about version control, code documentation and best practices

• Experience mining and integrating public databases and biorepositories a plus

• Experience working in therapeutic discovery, rare diseases, developmental biology or neuroscience is a plus

• Experience developing data visualizations for science teams a plus

• Excellent communication and interpersonal skills with an ability to work both independently and in a team environment

• A relentless drive and curiosity coupled with great resilience and adaptability

What we offer

• An opportunity to work closely with cutting-edge technology team and patient organizations on translational research

• Premium health and dental insurance

• Competitive salary and equity in a growing, well-funded startup

• Generous vacation policy