Postdoctoral Research Officer

Job Number

BU04087

School/Department

School of Environmental & Natural Sciences

Grade

7

Contract Duration

36 months (3 years)

Responsible to

Professor of Soil and Environmental Science

Overview

Wastewater represents a critical convergence point for AMR genes, mobile genetic elements, and resistant pathogens shed from human, animal, and agricultural sources. Surveillance of wastewater has demonstrated utility in tracking community-level AMR dynamics and in providing early warning signals for emerging resistance threats, including through pathogen genomic surveillance programmes deployed during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Bangor wastewater research team holds substantial longitudinal datasets comprising metagenomics, 16S rRNA amplicon sequencing, and quantitative PCR data from a network of monitoring sites across Welsh river catchments and wastewater treatment works. This post will focus on computational analysis and integration of these datasets to identify resistome trends, transmission routes, and environmental reservoirs of AMR.

The postholder will report jointly to Professor Davey Jones (Professor of Environmental Microbiology) and Dr Luke Hillary (Research Fellow, Wastewater Epidemiology). Professor Jones leads a broad portfolio of soil and water microbiome research within the School of Natural Sciences, with extensive national and international collaborations. Dr Hillary specialises in wastewater-based epidemiology and has led genomic surveillance programmes relevant to AMR and pathogen detection. Together they provide complementary expertise in environmental microbiology and applied bioinformatics.

The post is based at the Environment Centre Wales (ECW), a joint facility of Bangor University and UKCEH, providing a vibrant interdisciplinary research environment with access to state-of-the-art molecular and computational facilities.

The post is primarily based in Bangor, North Wales, with the option for some remote working in line with the University's Dynamic Working framework, to be agreed with line managers.

Occasional travel within the UK for site visits, consortium meetings, and conferences is anticipated; reasonable travel costs will be reimbursed.

This post is offered on a fixed-term basis for three years, subject to funding confirmation.

Purpose of the Job

The successful candidate will join our comprehensive research and monitoring programme studying a wide range of respiratory, skin-borne and gastrointestinal pathogens (e.g., Mpox, Influenza, Norovirus), antimicrobial resistance (AMR) markers and their host organisms (e.g. bacteria and fungi), illicit drugs and substances of abuse, and water quality indicators. The high throughput lab has state-of-the art equipment under gold-level service contracts. For example, we use qPCR, dPCR, Illumina NextSeq and MiSeq platforms for short read sequencing and the MinION, and GridION platforms for long read sequencing with access to other genomic facilities for NovaSeq analysis and the Wales Supercomputer network and Verily Workbench for bioinformatic processing. We also hold the national bioarchive of preserved wastewater samples. The programme also runs an extensive infrastructure of refrigerated composite autosamplers deployed across 41 wastewater treatment plants throughout Wales and at strategic hospital sites, providing excellent access to longitudinal environmental data. Our multidisciplinary approach is supported by dedicated sample collection, laboratory processing, and data analysis teams, ensuring a collaborative environment for research and innovation that delivers impact

The postholder will be responsible for analysing and publishing a series of experimental studies and laboratory-based studies, liaising with external and internal partners and project management.

Main Duties and Responsibilities

Research

• Lead bioinformatic analyses of wastewater metagenomic datasets to characterise AMR gene profiles, mobile genetic elements (plasmids, integrons, transposons), and resistant pathogen lineages.
• Develop, implement, and benchmark reproducible computational pipelines for resistome profiling, strain-level resolution, and longitudinal trend analysis.
• Integrate diverse data types (metagenomics, amplicon sequencing, qPCR, physicochemical metadata) to model spatial and temporal dynamics of AMR across catchment and treatment plant scales.
• Identify co-occurrence patterns between ARGs, mobile genetic elements, and pathogenic taxa, and assess public health significance of detected resistance profiles.
• Conduct comparative analyses between wastewater surveillance data and clinical/veterinary AMR datasets where accessible, contributing to One Health AMR insight.
• Prepare and submit high-quality manuscripts to peer-reviewed journals; contribute to project deliverable reports and stakeholder briefings.
• Present research findings at national and international conferences and project consortium meetings.

Data Management and Infrastructure

• Design and maintain organised, documented data management systems in line with FAIR data principles and funder requirements.
• Manage secure transfer and storage of metagenomic sequence data in collaboration with sequencing and clinical partners.
• Contribute to the development and maintenance of shared bioinformatic workflows on institutional HPC infrastructure and/or cloud platforms.
• Ensure adherence to data governance, ethical, and confidentiality protocols relevant to environmental and public health datasets.

Collaboration and Engagement

• Liaise with consortium partners, including public health agencies, water utilities, and clinical laboratories, to coordinate data sharing and align analytical approaches.
• Support undergraduate, Masters, and doctoral students within the research group through informal supervision and training in bioinformatics methods.
• Contribute to grant writing activities and the development of future funding bids.
• Participate in team meetings, research seminars, and group activities within the School of Natural Sciences and the wider Environment Centre Wales community.

Other Duties and Responsibilities

• The post holder will be expected to participate in performance review and developmental activities.
• The post holder will be expected to comply with the University’s equality policies and statements, Dignity at Work and Study Policy and the University’s Welsh Language Scheme.
• The post holder has a general and legal duty of care in relation to health, safety and wellbeing and must take all reasonable steps to ensure a safe and healthy working environment for themselves and for other members of staff, students and visitors affected by their actions or inactions. The post holder is also required to comply with all applicable health and safety policies, procedures and risk assessments.
• The post holder must comply with relevant legal and financial policies and procedures and be aware of their responsibilities in terms of the legal requirements of their post.

Person Specification

Qualifications

Essential

• PhD (awarded or near completion) in bioinformatics, microbial genomics, computational biology, environmental microbiology, or a closely related discipline.

Experience and Knowledge

Essential

• Experience with workflow management tools such as Snakemake, Nextflow, or equivalent.
• Demonstrable experience in metagenomic data analysis, including proficiency with standard pipelines for quality control, assembly, read-based classification, and functional annotation.
• Working knowledge of AMR gene databases (e.g. CARD, ResFinder, AMRFinderPlus) and tools for resistome and mobilome characterisation.
• Proficiency in at least one scripting language (Python and/or R) for data processing, statistical analysis, and visualisation.
• Experience working with high-performance computing (HPC) environments and/or cloud computing platforms.
• Proven ability to produce high-quality research outputs, as evidenced by first-author or co-author publications.
• Ability to work both independently and as part of a collaborative team
• Ability to manage multiple concurrent tasks, prioritise workload, and meet project deadlines.
• Strong written and oral communication skills, including experience presenting at seminars or conferences.

Desirable

• Experience with long-read sequencing data (Oxford Nanopore or PacBio) and hybrid assembly approaches for plasmid or strain reconstruction.
• Familiarity with wastewater epidemiology methods, including epidemiological curve modelling or sewage surveillance frameworks.
• Knowledge of mobile genetic element biology, plasmid classification (e.g. MOB-suite), or phage-host dynamics.
• Experience contributing to open-source software development or version-controlled collaborative coding (e.g. GitHub).
• GIS or spatial analysis skills in R or Python for catchment-scale data.
• Experience working in a multidisciplinary or inter-institutional research consortium.
• Communicating research findings to varied audiences, e.g. members of the public, industry and policy makers.
  
  

Other

Desirable

• The ability to communicate in Welsh is desirable for this post. If applicants are not able to speak / write in Welsh at present, there are many opportunities to learn if the successful candidate wishes to do so.

General

We are a member of Advance HE's Athena SWAN Gender Equality charter and hold a Silver award in recognition of our commitment to and progress towards gender equality within the University's policies, practices, and culture.

The University has recently achieved a Race Equality Charter Bronze award reflecting our commitment to building an inclusive and equitable society for black, Asian and minoritised ethnic staff.

We are proud to be a Disability Confident employer.

All members of staff have a duty to ensure their actions are in line with the overall environmental aims of the University and minimise their environmental impact.

All offers are made subject to proof of eligibility to work in the UK and receipt of satisfactory references.