Director, Immune Monitoring and Therapeutic Analytics - Oregon Health & Science University

Department Overview:

The OHSU Knight Cancer Institute, known as one of the pioneers in personalized cancer medicine, is an international leader in research and cancer treatment. Driven by its mission to end cancer as we know it, the institute is building upon its expertise in targeted treatments to advance the early detection of cancer when the disease is most treatable.

 

Every Knight Cancer employee is expected to embody our guiding principles:

• We act BOLDLY—Breakthroughs require pushing the boundaries of science, exploring new frontiers, and thinking differently
• We SUPPORT each other—Respect leads to trust, which leads to excellence
• We work as a CONNECTED team — We must leverage our collective brain power to conquer cancer because no one individual can do it alone

Function/Duties of Position:

This director position will be responsible for scientific oversight, strategic planning and day to day operations of the Immune Monitoring and Cancer Omics (IMCO) Laboratories at the Knight Cancer Institute. The director will be responsible for formal implementation of the IMCO’s mission, which is to provide state of the art technologies to internal and external research and clinical collaborators. Together with KDLs Senior Director of Operations, the position will be responsible for defining program offerings, determining the need for and implementing new offerings, ensuring a streamlined engagement processes with customers, unifying reporting tools/analytics, and overall coordination of the program. In this role the director will engage with potential internal and external clients, including pharmaceutical companies, research institutes, healthcare centers, and other relevant partners. The director will drive the scientific success of these collaborations and, importantly, serve as the organizational focal point for the program. Additionally, she/he will serve as the primary point of contact representing the Knight Cancer Institute and OHSU. This position will report to the Senior Director of Operations at the Knight Diagnostic Laboratories and have a dotted-line reporting to the IMCO scientific governance board.

 

In support of the IMCO program, this position will work closely with several core facilities and academic research stakeholders with the goal of providing a unified gateway to their services and thereby best meet the translational research needs of the clients. The director must have sufficient knowledge and experience in the areas of cancer biology and immunology as well as advanced understanding of data analysis. Some hands-on lab experience in either computational analysis and/or laboratory techniques is strongly desired. Strong leadership skills, the ability to meet deadlines, research goals, and milestones are essential. Serving as a liaison between the scientific board, business development team and potential clients, this position will be responsible for directly overseeing all IMCO projects.

 

Duties include:

• Define, develop and review initial and on-going program offerings, unify reporting tools/analytics used, and coordinate overall execution of the IMCO program such that it functions as a “single-entry” point for customers.
•  Oversee an innovative, cross-functional team that will work together under the IMCO platform to build and execute academic, biotech and pharmaceutical projects.
•  Engage in hands on execution of IMCO offerings in the lab, helping to optimize and run or analyze patient data.
•  Develop and implement scope of work for all projects and clients including milestone tracking and data delivery. Establish individual project scientific and operational goals in a detailed and standardized fashion.
•  Establish a relationship with basic and clinical research investigators integrating IMCO’s research platform into clinical trials and basic research labs, including education of potential customers on optimal use of the IMCO program to support basic and translational research.
•  In collaboration with KDL and Knight Biolibrary, establish and develop protocols for data handling and biospecimen procurement and storage.
• Identify roles needed, develop job descriptions, and oversee hiring for critical FTEs for the program and help with their integration into the workflow.
•  Develop and streamline the analytics for all assays for mIHC, cyCIF, scRNAseq and CyTOF and other assays such as NanoString GeoMx DSP and other NGS based assays.
•  Lead the bioinformatics team to develop automated analytics pipelines, establish new data visualization algorithms, streamline and standardize reports and deliverables in a professional, well-organized format.
• Provide scientific insight for generated assay reports including observations, data interpretation and clinically relevant recommendations.
•  Lead the effort on generation and implementation of a GLP-like research standards across all research assays including operational due diligence with external clients such as Astra Zeneca.
•  Work together with IMCO’s program manager to continue to development and implement standardized SOPs and operational flows (including specimen receipt, handling and tracking, QM plan, document control, BEMs and others).

Required Qualifications:

• PhD in life sciences
• 4 years of post-graduate work experience
• Proficient and comfortable with a highly diversified, multi-disciplinary work environment demonstrating ability to simultaneously drive multiple complex projects
• Proficient knowledge of cancer biology and immunology in the context of cancer clinical trials
• Minimum of 3-5 years of experience engaging academic researchers, clinicians and industry partners in effective communication to collaborate on complex, translational projects
• Thorough knowledge of clinical trials structure and design including detailed understanding of human research sample procurement and handling
• Ability to interact professionally with all levels of OHSU and partner organizations from front-line staff to high-level executives
• Ability to manage high volume information flow of scientific concepts in a very organized and timely manner
• Demonstrate excellent communication, analytical and organizational skills while working independently and as part of a team while being collaborative in resolving problems
• Ability to use tact and diplomacy to maintain effective working relationships. Proficiency with computers and MS Office suite

Preferred Qualifications:

• PhD in Cancer Immunology or PhD in Computational Biology
• High proficiency in development and implementation of spatial transcriptomics, and single cell data processing and analysis
• Ability to build and implement high-throughput and automated analysis pipelines
• In depth knowledge of R or Python computer language

Additional Details:

Apply online. Please be sure to upload a Cover Letter and Resume/CV.

 

We offer a variety of benefits on top of joining a thriving organization:

• Medical, dental and vision coverage at no or low cost to employees
  • Covered 100% for full-time employees and 88% for dependents
• Several retirement plans to choose from with contributions from OHSU
• 25 days a year of paid time off
• 8 days of sick time off
• Commuter subsidies
• Tuition reimbursement
• Access to group life insurance, disability insurance and other supplemental benefits
• Annual Merit Increase
• Growth/Development Opportunities
• Employee discounts to local and major businesses

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All are welcome:Oregon Health & Science University values a diverse and culturally competent workforce. We are proud of our commitment to being an equal opportunity, affirmative action organization that does not discriminate against applicants on the basis of any protected class status, including disability status and protected veteran status. Individuals with diverse backgrounds and those who promote diversity and a culture of inclusion are encouraged to apply. To request reasonable accommodation contact the Affirmative Action and Equal Opportunity Department at 503-494-5148 or aaeo@ohsu.edu.