The Translational NeuroEngineering Laboratory (TNEL) in the University of Minnesota Department of Psychiatry has a multi-year funded opening for a post-doctoral Researcher in the area of biomarkers discovery for psychiatric illness. Our laboratory develops technologies to reverse the circuit impairments that cause mental illness, including depression, obsessive-compulsive disorder, PTSD, and addictions. Our work is regularly published in high-impact clinical, engineering, and scientific journals. More information is available at http://www.tnelab.org/ . This specific position will be working on a project to use standardized stimuli (psychophysical tasks), electroencephalography, and other forms of physiologic recording to detect when patients are experiencing suicidal thinking or other severe psychiatric symptoms.

Our laboratory includes both animal and human research components, and you will interact almost daily with other neuroscientists and engineers. There are extremely broad opportunities for collaboration and networking with clinicians, basic neuroscientists, and engineers. This is a patient-facing role, as most research participants will have some symptoms.

This particular position is on a DARPA project, and will require a higher than usual level of independence and initiative. On the other hand, it has a higher than usual probability of yielding high-impact publications and/or patentable inventions.

Job Responsibilities/Duties:

●(20%) Collect physiologic data from human participants performing standardized psychological tasks.
●(20%) Lead set-up and maintenance of experimental rigs, including troubleshooting of acquisition software and hardware as needed.
●(10%) Assist with task and experiment design and redesign to maximize the quality and signal content of collected data.
●(10%) Maintain experimental records with strong attention to detail and completeness.
●(10%) Analyze and summarize experimental results, in formats suitable for internal review and scientific dissemination in peer-reviewed forums. This will include both written and graphical communication.
●(10%) Maintain compliance with all applicable governmental and institutional regulations, including drafting of formal protocols for approval and maintenance of relevant records.
●(20%) Hire, train, and supervise bachelors-level research technicians to assist with all of the above.
 

Required Qualifications:

●A doctoral degree (or equivalent) in a relevant field. "Relevant" is broad. Psychology, neuroscience, engineering, cognitive science, and many other disciplines could qualify.
●Strong programming skills. MATLAB or Python is essential. R would be helpful, as would JavaScript, but they are not required.
●Prior experience with physiologic recordings in humans, resulting in peer-reviewed publications.
●Excellent verbal and written communication skills. Much of our work requires explaining complex technical concepts to non-domain-experts. This job in particular involves coordinating between multiple laboratories.
●Evidence of substantial capability for independent work, problem-solving, and initiative-taking. This will be directly solicited from references.
●Interpersonal skills appropriate for collaboration in a very multidisciplinary and highly diverse environment.

Additional qualifications of high interest would be:

●Prior experience specifically in EEG or other neuroscience work with psychiatric populations.
●Prior training or experience in machine learning analyses.
●Prior work in parametric modeling or latent-variable models of behavior
●Experience with experimental or clinical brain stimulation.

About University of Minnesota Twin Cities

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