Job ID: 102421

PhD Internship / RiSE program- Building a cross-disease, cross-modality human microglial single cell atlas for 9 months from March/April (m/f/d)

Position: Ph.D. Student

Deadline: 25 February 2023

Employment Start Date: 15 March 2023

City: Basel

Country: Switzerland

Institution: F. Hoffmann-La Roche AG

Department:

Description:

The Position

Who we are

At Roche, 98.000 people across 150 countries are pushing back the frontiers of healthcare. Working together, we`ve become one of the world`s leading research focused healthcare groups. Our success is built on innovation, curiosity and diversity, and on seeing each other`s differences as an advantage. To innovate healthcare,

Roche has ambitious plans to keep learning and growing – and is seeking people who have the same goals for themselves.

At Roche, we believe it’s urgent to deliver medical solutions right now – even as we develop innovations for the future. We are passionate about transforming patients’lives and we are fearless in both decision and action. And we believe that good business means a better world. That is why we come to work every single day. We commit ourselves to scientific rigour, unassailable ethics, and access to medical innovations for all. We do this today to build a better tomorrow.

 

The Position

The RiSE program (Roche Internships for Scientific Exchange) is a highly competitive student research program at Roche. It offers the most talented postgraduate PhD and medical degree students the opportunity to be fully integrated into our interdisciplinary and international industry R&D environment. As a RiSE student you will enhance your competencies, gain valuable work experience with us,and eventually become part of a world-wide network of RiSE Alumni.The Neuroscience and Rare Diseases Discovery and Translational Area (NRD DTA) is developing medicines for a range of serious neurological diseases, including multiple sclerosis, Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, autism, spinal muscular atrophy, and Huntington’s disease.

As RiSE student in the NRD DTA you will join our group in the Neurogenomics section at the Roche Innovation Center Basel, Switzerland. We are a multidisciplinary team with expertise in single cell analysis, human genetics, organoids, CRISPR screens, all focused on the central nervous system.

Microglia are critical cell types in multiple disorders, including Alzheimer’s disease,Parkinson’s disease and Multiple sclerosis. Preliminary single cell transcriptomic evidence suggests that microglia can acquire different states. In order to characterize the different states of microglia in healthy and disease human brains, you will build an atlas of human microglia, starting with internal plus publicly available single nuclei RNA-seq data. We will use the atlas to identify states that are signatures of diseases such as Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease and multiple sclerosis, and to characterize in-house in-vitro models of microglia. For the right candidate, there will be scope for method development, for example integration of single nuclei and single cell data. You will be hosted and mentored by a Roche scientist who will guide you through your research and provide you with computational and scientific support, and will introduce you to the Department.

 

During the internship your tasks will include:

  • Reviewing literature on state-of-the-art machine learning methods for single cell data integration (e.g. https://openproblems.bio/benchmarks/multimodal_data_integration/)
  • Reviewing literature on the relevance of microglial states to a range of disease indications
  • Obtaining and processing public and internal data on microglia, starting with in-housedata
  • Testing multiple different strategies for data integration on the prepared data, using the Roche high performance computing cluster
  • Collaborating closely with biologists to annotate the identified clusters
  • Identifying the best pipeline for building cross-modality atlases (this may include your own method development)
  • Identifying microglia states associated with Parkinson’s disease, Alzheimer’s disease and multiple sclerosis
  • Interacting with scientists in global cross-functional teams to present the results internally
  • Prepare the first draft of a scientific publication (conference and/or scientific journal)

 

Who You Are

You’re someone who wants to influence your own development. You’re looking for a company where you have the opportunity to pursue your interests across functions and geographies. Where a job title is not considered the final definition of who you are, but the starting point.

Moreover you are/have:

  • Enrolled in a PhD or medical degree program at a university and are looking to expand your experience with an industry internship
  • Strong experience in single cell computational biology
  • Strong skills in working with relevant packages one of R or Python (Seurat, SingleCellExperiment, scanpy) is essential; competence in both would be better!
  • Keen interest in biology – knowledge of neuroscience is desirable but can be compensated for by sufficient curiosity and enthusiasm
  • Passion for using computational skills to give robust answers to meaningful biological questions with high translational impact

 

Information about application documents and start date:

The preferred start date of the internship is March/April 2023 or upon availability. Application deadline: 7th of February.

Applications need to include a CV and a cover letter, as well as a letter from your academic supervisor supporting your application to the RiSE Program.

Please also note that due to regulations non-EU/EFTA citizens have to provide a certificate from the university stating that an industry internship is mandatory as part of the university training.

Applications need to include a CV and a cover letter, as well as a letter from your academic supervisor supporting your application to the RiSE Program.

Please note that due to regulations non-EU/EFTA citizens have to provide a certificate from the university stating that an industry internship is mandatory as part of the university training.

 

Do you know what Roche stands for? Roche embraces diversity and equal opportunity in a serious way. We are committed to building a team that represents a variety of backgrounds, perspectives, and skills. The more inclusive we are, the better our work will be.

If you still have questions, then please check our FAQs and videos on careers.roche.ch/faq

 

Who we are

At Roche, more than 100,000 people across 100 countries are pushing back the frontiers of healthcare. Working together, we’ve become one of the world’s leading research-focused healthcare groups. Our success is built on innovation, curiosity and diversity.

Basel is the headquarters of the Roche Group and one of its most important centres of pharmaceutical research. Over 10,700 employees from over 100 countries come together at our Basel/Kaiseraugst site, which is one of Roche`s largest sites. Read more.

Besides extensive development and training opportunities, we offer flexible working options, 18 weeks of maternity leave and 10 weeks of gender independent partnership leave. Our employees also benefit from multiple services on site such as child-care facilities, medical services, restaurants and cafeterias, as well as various employee events.

We believe in the power of diversity and inclusion, and strive to identify and create opportunities that enable all people to bring their unique selves to Roche.

Roche is an Equal Opportunity Employer.