As a UW employee, you have a unique opportunity to change lives on our campuses, in our state and around the world. UW employees offer their boundless energy, creative problem solving skills and dedication to build stronger minds and a healthier world.

UW faculty and staff also enjoy outstanding benefits, professional growth opportunities and unique resources in an environment noted for diversity, intellectual excitement, artistic pursuits and natural beauty.

The Brotman Baty Institute for Precision Medicine (BBI) is a joint venture between the University of Washington (UW), the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center and Seattle Children’s Hospital, made possible by a $50 million gift from the Brotman and Baty Families. The BBI offers a dynamic work environment with cutting-edge science and computational resources. The BBI developer team is a small, newly formed group committed to embracing best practices and using a breadth of technologies to support the BBI’s mission to deliver impactful results to research and public health.

POSITION PURPOSE:
A position for a Sr. Software Developer is available at the Brotman-Baty Institute (BBI) to work on an open-source research platform enabling a large-scale study of respiratory illness in Seattle. The developer team leverages cloud technologies across AWS and Azure and writes most code in Python, with PostgreSQL as the primary datastore.

The Brotman Baty Institute for Precision Medicine (BBI) is a joint venture of the University of Washington, the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center and Seattle Children’s Hospital, made possible by a $50 million gift from the Brotman and Baty Families. The Brotman Baty Institute offers a dynamic work environment with cutting-edge science and computational resources.

POSITION COMPLEXITIES:
The Seattle Flu Study, already in its third year, has produced high-resolution analyses of the spread of influenza and other respiratory illnesses in Seattle. In year one of the study, the SFS sampled and sequenced thousands of influenza and other respiratory pathogens in near-real time, and, from these viral genome sequences, uncovered influenza transmission dynamics. In year two of the study, the team identified the first instance of community spread of COVID-19 in the United States, and transitioned to help support public health surveillance through the Seattle Coronavirus Assessment Network, in partnership with Seattle Public Health King County. In year three, the SFS is adding projects to support organizations returning to school and work.

DUTIES & RESPONSIBILITIES:
Develop and maintain the information and analysis systems underlying the SFS’s research aims, with potential expansion to new studies around the world in the future. The existing software platform used in the study ingests subject and sample metadata, lab assay results, and raw and processed genome data. It also provides access to this curated data for downstream analysis. The platform is open-source, adaptable, and designed with future infectious disease outbreak surveillance in mind, regardless of the targeted pathogen. (75%)

Collaborate with a diverse interdisciplinary team across faculty, staff, outside project collaborators based in different home institutions to define informatics needs for the study and communicate updates. (25%)

Within those two major aims, more specific job duties include:
Product development: Interfacing with faculty, outside project collaborators, staff, and student employees both in-person and online, learning software requirements, collaborating on design, communicating updates regarding job build, specs, and all job duties listed above. Guiding junior staff and student employees on related programming and software engineering topics.

Budgeting: responsibility for managing the budget for the software development arm of the infectious disease surveillance portion of the project, including hardware or software purchases, contracts for cloud computing, consultants, etc., as well as developing budgets for any future grants funds or additional funding requests on existing project. 

Communications: As requested, occasional presentation of software tool’s capabilities to UW leadership, donors, and public health officials, including dashboard, and near-real time map of the spread of infectious diseases, and adaptation or evolution of pathogens over time – to aid in shaping UW Medicine’s and other agencies’ response to public health emergencies.

Teaching: When situation permits, serve as an invited guest lecturer in software development or genome sciences courses on the software development behind an emerging global pathogenic threat. Lessons learned, and how to prepare for the future. Navigating real-time adaptations, information sources, and the politics of information gathering and dissemination, as well as translational barriers and successes to effective implementation of data presented.

MINIMUM REQUIREMENTS

B.S. degree in computer science, engineering or other equivalent field.

Minimum five years related experience required, whether in an academic or professional setting.

ADDITIONAL REQUIREMENTS

Candidates should have outstanding academic and professional track record.

Successful candidates will be highly self-motivated and enthusiastic about taking a hands-on approach to collaborative scientific discovery efforts.

Candidates should be fluent in at least one high-level programming language, such as Python, JavaScript, Ruby, or Perl.

Experience with relational database systems. We primarily use PostgreSQL.

Enthusiasm about writing code that is robust, understandable, and maintainable.

Candidates should also have excellent written and verbal communication skills. Interfacing with project collaborators in-person and online is a key aspect of both positions. Both positions will work within a small team and collaborate with other institutions.

If you think you might be a great fit for this position but are concerned about meeting all qualifications, we'd like to hear from you anyway.

PREFERRED REQUIREMENTS

The ideal candidate for the Software Developer positions would have expertise in web development and cloud infrastructure.

Experience with software engineering best practices including code development, operational support, and documentation.

Experience or interest in public health, biology, bioinformatics or genomics.

The Brotman Baty Institute is committed to improving diversity in the computational sciences. Applicants of diverse backgrounds are particularly encouraged to apply.

Application Process:
The application process for UW positions may include completion of a variety of online assessments to obtain additional information that will be used in the evaluation process.  These assessments may include Work Authorization, Cover Letter and/or others.  Any assessments that you need to complete will appear on your screen as soon as you select “Apply to this position”. Once you begin an assessment, it must be completed at that time; if you do not complete the assessment you will be prompted to do so the next time you access your “My Jobs” page. If you select to take it later, it will appear on your "My Jobs" page to take when you are ready. Please note that your application will not be reviewed, and you will not be considered for this position until all required assessments have been completed.