HMS - Research Associate in SBGrid, Department of Biological Chemistry and Molecular Pharmacology

HMS - Research Associate in SBGrid, Department of Biological Chemistry and Molecular Pharmacology

Title HMS - Research Associate in SBGrid, Department of Biological Chemistry and Molecular Pharmacology

School Harvard Medical School

Department/Area ***

We invite applications for a Research Associate position in SBGrid at Harvard Medical School. This academically appointed role advances discovery in structural biology by curating, validating, and benchmarking the software that underpins structure determination. You will collaborate with investigators and SBGrid engineers to design scientifically grounded tests, codify reproducible environments, and drive community standards, leveraging Python and shell scripting to automate builds, packaging, and CI/CD.

You will contribute to methods, training, and publications that strengthen computational rigor across cryo-EM, crystallography, NMR, and related modalities.

SBGrid is a research software platform and global consortium in Harvard Medical School’s Department of Biological Chemistry and Molecular Pharmacology. We build, install, and rigorously curate 600+ encapsulated, ready-to-run applications spanning crystallography, cryo-EM, NMR, visualization, computational chemistry, and supporting tools, delivered across on-premises and cloud environments for hundreds of laboratories worldwide. Our Capsule Software Execution Environment (Capsules) isolates every application with its exact dependencies, providing zero-configuration, conflict-free execution on 64-bit Linux and Intel/ ARM macOS.

The collection includes 56,000+ executables, 510,000+ dynamic libraries, and a mix of open-source and academic licenses, with 220+ titles under OSI licenses; our unified licensing streamlines research use. SBGrid releases updates monthly and maintains a modular installation manager that now supports thousands of active installations, enabling seamless, secured updates for labs and individual users alike. The platform advances FAIR /FAIR4RS software goals and reproducible research across heterogeneous systems;

our Bio Grids collection extends these methods beyond structural biology to 700+ computational biology titles.

With this appointment, you are represented by the Harvard Academic Workers (HAW) – UAW for purposes of collective bargaining and matters affecting your compensation and working conditions.

This is a position that is based at a Harvard campus location with some remote work options available. Additional details will be discussed during the interview process. All remote work must be performed within one of the Harvard Registered Payroll States, which currently includes Massachusetts, Connecticut, Maine, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Vermont, Georgia, Illinois, Maryland, New Jersey, New York, Virginia, Washington, and California (CA for exempt positions only).

Certain visa types and funding sources may limit work location. Individuals must meet work location sponsorship requirements prior to employment.

• PhD-trained structural biologist with 2 or more years of hands-on experience in CryoEM workflows and analysis.
• 3 years of experience working in Unix-like environments (Linux/macOS) and command line.

• Exceptional written and verbal communication skills
  , with the ability to convey complex concepts with clarity and precision in a fast-paced, dynamic environment (e.g. demonstrated through scientific publications).
• Proven effectiveness in cross-functional collaboration and project management
  .
• Demonstrated programming proficiency in Python and strong scripting skills (Bash/shell).
• Hands-on experience with structure determination software supporting X-ray crystallography and cryo-electron tomography (CryoET).
• Familiarity with molecular dynamics simulations and macromolecular docking tools is highly desirable.
• Packaging and environment management (Conda/venv);
  containers (Docker/Singularity); CI/CD; build systems (CMake); version control (Git).
• High-Performance Computing schedulers (e.g., Slurm); cloud familiarity.
• Bonus: one or more compiled/scientific languages (C/C++/Fortran/Julia/R) and experience…