APPLICATION INSTRUCTIONS:
CURRENT PENN STATE EMPLOYEE (faculty, staff, technical service, or student), please login to Workday to complete the internal application process . Please do not apply here, apply internally through Workday.
CURRENT PENN STATE STUDENT (not employed previously at the university) and seeking employment with Penn State, please login to Workday to complete the student application process. Please do not apply here, apply internally through Workday.
If you are NOT a current employee or student, please click “Apply” and complete the application process for external applicants .
Approval of remote and hybrid work is not guaranteed regardless of work location. For additional information on remote work at Penn State, see Notice to Out of State Applicants .
This position is funded for 1 year(s); continuation past 1 year(s) will be based on university need, performance, and/or availability of funding.
POSITION SPECIFICS
The National Synthesis Center for Emergence in the Molecular and Cellular Sciences (NCEMS) supported by the Huck Institutes of the Life Sciences seeks qualified candidates for the position of Staff Scientist Supervisor .
This position will be filled at the Research Computing Software Engineer - Supervisor level.
The Staff Scientist Supervisor leads the development of research software, analytical tools, and reproducible computational workflows that support NCEMS Working Groups in synthesizing molecular and cellular science datasets. Working with investigators, staff scientists, and technical partners, this role translates scientific requirements into software solutions that enable cross-study analysis, modeling, and data-driven discovery.
This position combines hands-on research software engineering and computational problem-solving with supervision of assigned staff. The incumbent oversees software development, testing, deployment, maintenance, and integration with shared computing environments, while advising the NCEMS Director on technical priorities, risks, staffing, and resource needs.
This is a hands-on research computing and software engineering leadership role responsible for technical implementation, software quality, computational support, and supervision of technical staff. The position complements the Scientific Program Manager and Project Manager by leading research software development, computational workflows, and research computing operations rather than research administration or portfolio governance.
Key Responsibilities
Research Software Development and Maintenance
Design, develop, adapt, and maintain research applications, analytical scripts, and software tools that address scientific needs identified by NCEMS Working Groups.
Write, test, document, and maintain software using modern scientific programming languages to integrate and process complex biological datasets.
Develop and refine algorithms, data structures, and processing routines supporting cross-study synthesis, molecular and cellular analysis, and computational modeling.
Implement software enhancements that improve the reliability, usability, and value of analytical tools.
Coordinate software testing, validation, version control, release management, and ongoing maintenance of NCEMS-supported tools and workflows.
Computational Workflows and Research Infrastructure
Develop and support computational pipelines that enable researchers to organize, harmonize, analyze, and reuse datasets from multiple sources.
Integrate research tools and workflows with university, high-performance computing, cloud, and other approved research computing environments.
Collaborate with computing specialists and research personnel to identify storage, processing, access, and workflow execution requirements.
Optimize computational performance by resolving bottlenecks, memory-use issues, and other efficiency constraints.
Promote portability, reproducibility, and sustainable operation of analytical workflows across participating research…