Postdoctoral Research Assistant in Statistical Machine Learning for Genomics

This position is offered full time on a fixed term contract for 36 months and is funded by the European Research Council. Only applications received before 12 midday (UK time) on 10 November 2026 will be considered.

We invite applications for a Postdoctoral Research Assistant in Statistical Machine Learning for Genomics to join the Palamara Group at the University of Oxford, funded by the European Research Council (ERC). Working with Professor Pier Palamara, you will develop novel statistical and machine learning methods for large-scale genomic, phenotypic and health data to address questions in human genetics and evolution.

The research programme brings together statistical inference, machine learning and AI to study the genetic basis of complex traits and how evolution shapes their genetic architectures. Possible directions include genomic language models, multimodal learning integrating genomic and health data with functional, genealogical and evolutionary information, federated learning, and multi-trait and multi-ancestry methods. Applications include association testing, fine-mapping and polygenic prediction.

You will develop scalable methods, implement reproducible research software and apply them to biobank-scale datasets, rigorously evaluating their statistical properties and predictive performance. You will prepare publications, present findings, collaborate with project researchers and provide guidance to junior researchers.