Applications are invited for the post of Research Assistant or Associate in Influenza Dynamics to join The Medical Research Council (MRC) Centre for Outbreak Analysis and Modelling based in the Department of Infectious Disease Epidemiology in the School of Public Health at Imperial College London.

We are looking for candidates with a strong quantitative background who want to study the transmission dynamics of infectious disease.

The successful candidate will work on data from a Wellcome Trust funded project; the FluScape study in southern China, has enrolled ~1000 households in 40 urban and rural communities in order to measure social contacts and exposure to influenza. The primary objectives of the study are to better understand the transmission of respiratory pathogens through space and over the course of a human life span. In the next few years, we will be particularly interested in the interaction of repeat vaccination and natural infection. This study is in collaboration with a number of international partners, including Johns Hopkins, University of Florida, University of Hong Kong, Shantou University and the Peoples Number 12 Hospital in Guangzhou. Work on this project will involve travel to the field site in China and to other collaborator sites and, specifically for this post, will involve the design and implementation of dynamic models of human B-ell repertoires.

This post provides the opportunity to develop state-of-the-art mathematical models of a key human pathogen, within a world-renowned theoretical group; and to test those models against some of the best currently available data. Also, the field and lab studies are ongoing. The successful candidate will have the opportunity to visit field sites and labs, influence the design of future studies and, generally, to develop skills in the design and implementation of empirical infectious disease dynamics.

Applicants should have an MSc (for appointment to Research Assistant) or PhD (for appointment to Research Associate) or equivalent in one of the following areas: mathematics, population biology, epidemiology, statistics or a related discipline. You should have research experience of working with models of disease spread and mechanistic models. You should also have In-depth knowledge of a software programming language or a scientific analysis package (e.g. R, C++, MatLab or Mathematica).

This post is full time and fixed term until 30 April 2021 and will be based at the St Mary’s Campus, Paddington. Imperial College is supportive of flexible working. The College is happy to discuss the possibility of implementing such arrangements for this post, with suitably qualified people, subject to operational requirements.