CANDIDATE BRIEF

Research Software Engineer in Healthcare Data Analytics Solutions,

Faculty of Engineering

Salary: Grade 7 (£32,548 – £38,833 p.a.)

Reference: ENGCP1076

Closing date: 06 September 2018

Fixed-term until 31 December 2020 We will consider flexible working arrangements

Research Software Engineer in Healthcare Data Analytics Solutions School of Computing

Are you a full stack developer who enjoys working with innovative technology? Do you have a background in cloud computing frameworks and big data analysis with experience in biomedical imaging pipelines? Do you have a passion for large heterogeneous data systems and working across the full stack? Are you ready to think out-of-the-box, innovate and find solutions to challenging distributed systems problems?

The Centre for Computational Imaging and Simulation Technologies in Biomedicine (CISTIB), within the Faculties of Engineering and Medicine & Health, involves various academics and their research groups. CISTIB focuses on algorithmic and applied research in the areas of computational imaging, and image-based computational physiology modelling and simulation. CISTIB contributes in different areas of medical image computing and image-based biomechanical and computational physiology modelling. CISTIB works in close cooperation with clinicians from various research centres from the University of Leeds and the academic hospitals of the Leeds Teaching Hospital Trust Foundation, the largest NHS Trust of the UK.

Clinical areas where CISTIB members have contributed to, and made substantive innovations in the field are focused around the cardiovascular, musculoskeletal and neural systems, where they have developed diagnostic and prognostic quantitative image-based biomarkers and methods and systems for interventional planning and guidance. The centre hosts academic members from the University of Leeds and Research Fellows, Research Associates, PhD Students and Scientific Software Developers forming a cross-disciplinary team committed to clinical translation of their innovations.

You will be part of the Scientific Software Development (SSD) team at CISTIB that is the responsible for the development and maintenance of the MULTI-X Platform, the GIMIAS platform, and the prototypes developed for specific domains based on these platforms, and the prototypes we develop as part of our involvement in local and international projects. SSD activities include but are not limited to support, dissemination, training and software development. As a senior member of the team, you will contribute at the technical and management level to accomplish the different challenges and project objectives and will contribute to the planning of joint research projects led by the Principal Investigator.

What does the role entail?

As a Research Software Engineer your main duties will include:  Taking primary responsibility for the deployment, optimisation, testing, and documentation of the MULTI-X Platform to commercial standards. Lead responsibility for the low-level systems and software infrastructure. Generating and pursuing independent and original ideas to enhance the framework;  Developing, improving, maintaining and monitoring many heterogeneous systems, software components, datasets and prototypes developed by CISTIB. Designing, deploying and incorporating new assets to improve their capabilities;  Proactively liaising with CISTIB members and external users to receive feedback on the usability of the platform and prioritise its functionality;  Providing scientific software development services, carrying out diverse work on scientific programming, parallel and cloud computing, porting applications to new platforms, image processing tasks, advanced data querying, data visualisation, large-scale data handling and container orchestration;  Designing, planning and executing computational and data-intensive analysis pipelines, and provide means to compile and analyse the results;  Delivering working environments for Machine Learning, Deep Learning and Big data analysis using scalable cloud computing resources;  Safeguarding system components by identifying and solving potential and actual security threats, ensuring the compliance with IT standards and privacy regulations;  Maintaining effective coding documentation and code repositories to improve the efficiency with which new researchers learn to develop and exploit scientific applications and datasets, with responsibility for undertaking peer review of code to ensure consistency and quality of development work;  Collaborating in larger and/or longer-term software development projects relating to CISTIB research activities. Participating as a formal collaborator in projects that make use of CISTIB scientific software and platforms;  Liaising closely with academic and researchers who are leaders in computational imaging, modelling, algorithms and methods. Liaising with

departmental colleagues to ensure the successful operation of the SSD services, sharing knowledge and expertise;  Delivering expert technical advisory and highly specialist consultative services relating to research software development, to technical and non-technical audiences. Responding to incoming support requests relating to using the SSD services and CISTIB Platforms;  Developing and maintaining training material to support internal users and projects and platforms users, and for dissemination;  Organising events to demonstrate the software to academics, researchers, and other third parties. Delivering training courses and webinars as required;  Engaging and networking with peer community. Participating, and collaborating with relevant specialist networks. Contributing ideas, experience and thinking to disparate working groups across CISTIB;  Deputising for the Technology Officer in projects and to take responsibility as the main CISTIB contact point in project work packages and tasks when required;  Undertaking continuing professional development. Seeking to expand and maintain up-to-date knowledge of key technologies, methods and approaches related to software engineering and relevant research areas;  Create periodic reports relating to the delivery and use of SSD services.

These duties provide a framework for the role and should not be regarded as a definitive list. Other reasonable duties may be required consistent with the grade of the post.

What will you bring to the role?

As a Research Software Engineer you will have:  Demonstrated success in leading and managing complex technology development projects and cross-functional teams, working alongside researchers, helping them to make the most of technology and innovation breakthroughs, in one of these areas: (i) Computational engineering, (ii) Biomedical engineering, (iii) Mathematics or statistics, (iv) Scientific visualisation, (v) Computational Imaging;  Extensive experience with common libraries for DICOM and image processing (VTK, ITK and PyDICOM); storage systems (XnaT, PACS); data collection systems (RedCap, OpenClinica, OpenEMR);  Professional experience with server-side languages such as (PHP, Python, Ruby, Java, JavaScript, and .Net) and related frameworks (Ruby On Rails, CodeIgniter, Django or CakePHP);  Experience with front-end development frameworks (Bootstrap, Semantic UI or Foundation), JavaScript frameworks (Angular JS, React, VUE.JS) and excellent web language skills (HTML, JavaScript, CSS, SASS/LESS, XML, JSON, JQuery and Ajax);  Strong expertise and experience in data management, large-scale data analysis, federated data sharing (iRODS), databases standards and query languages (MySQL, PostgreSQL, MSSQL, Oracle, NoSQL or MongoDB);  Extensive experience deploying web services (Apache, NodeJS, Nginx, Tomcat, IIS); and production-mode experience designing and developing API and RESTful interfaces;  Professional experience integrating Continuous Integration and Continuous Delivery systems (Jenkins-Hudson, Travis CI, CDash), deploying Test Driven Development systems; and implementing Agile methodology using JIRA;  Substantial knowledge in code versioning (SVN, GIT, GitHub and Bitbucket) and standard build automation utilities (Conda, CMake, ANT, GCC);  Excellent multi-platform system administration skills: Windows/ systems deployed on cloud or virtualised environments (AWS, OpenStack, VMware, ESX), using containers technologies (Docker, Kubernetes, Singularity) and leveraging Configuration Management tools (Chef, Puppet, Ansible);  Effective communication skills, with the ability to understand user requirements and communicate technical information to non-technical partners, and to disseminate the research work and outcomes to both the scientific community and the wider scientific community;  Ability to actively engage with clinical collaborators to better understand the clinical problems which motivate the research and to ensure that the solutions developed are clinically viable;  Ability to work effectively as part of a multidisciplinary team and to collaborate, co-operate and participate with others to achieve common objectives, sharing experience and ideas, and working together to make the most of technology and innovation breakthroughs;  Ability to learn and apply project management skills in large interdisciplinary projects, to analyse and solve problems with an appreciation of longer-term implications;

 Ability to deputise for the Technology Officer in projects and to take responsibility as the main CISTIB contact point in project work packages and tasks when required.

You may also have:  A PhD or equivalent experience in a relevant area of computer science or electrical engineering.

How to apply

You can apply for this role online; more guidance can be found on our How to Apply information page. Applications should be submitted by 23.59 (UK time) on the advertised closing date.

Contact information

To explore the post further or for any queries you may have, please contact:

Professor Alex Frangi, Diamond Jubilee Chair of Computational Medicine Tel: +44 (0)113 343 5430 Email: [email protected]

Additional information

Faculty and School Information Further information is available on the research and teaching activities of the Faculty of Engineering and the School of Computing.

A diverse workforce The Faculty of Engineering is proud to have been awarded the Athena Swan Silver Award from the Equality Challenge Unit, the national body that promotes equality in the higher education sector. Our equality and inclusion webpage provides more information.

Working at Leeds Find out more about the benefits of working at the University and what it is like to live and work in the Leeds area on our Working at Leeds information page.

Candidates with disabilities Information for candidates with disabilities, impairments or health conditions, including requesting alternative formats, can be found on our Accessibility information page or by getting in touch with us at [email protected].

Criminal record information

Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974

A criminal record check is not required for this position. However, all applicants will be required to declare if they have any ‘unspent’ criminal offences, including those pending.

Any offer of appointment will be in accordance with our Criminal Records policy. You can find out more about required checks and declarations in our Criminal Records information page.