To the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative,
I am writing to express my interest in the Science Program Officer, Computational Biology position. Briefly, I have a Ph.D. in Cell and Molecular Biology. My interdisciplinary graduate and post-doctoral research integrate molecular and bioinformatic approaches to address long-standing questions in neuroscience. I use R and Juypter extensively for conducting and sharing statistical analyses of large biological datasets. A recent fellowship in Community Engagement gave me a foundation of best practices in project management, people management, and scholarly communication for cultivating healthy scientific communities.
When I started my Ph.D. program in 2012, genomic sequencing was on the rise, but training in bioinformatics was lagging. To fill this gap, I worked with the Center for Computational Biology and Bioinformatics to organize a series of workshops for students and staff to receive the computational training they needed. I also organized three annual symposia to bring together scientists, engineers, and medical doctors who were using similar tools to solve diverse problems. By building relationships across academic disciplines and into industry, government, medicine, we were able to foster new collaborations and promote the transfer of knowledge.
After completing my Ph.D., I joined Dr. Titus Brown's lab as a technical liaison for the Data Commons Pilot Phase Consortium (DCPPC), focusing on communication and community engagement. The DCPPC consisted of about 500 scientist, engineers, developers, and funders from over a dozen institutions whose common goals was to build cloud-based infrastructure that would make biomedical data more findable, accessible, interoperable, and reusable (FAIR). I co-authored onboarding documentation, co-organized in-person meetings, facilitated webinars, conducted online retrospectives, and beta-tested software. Even though the funding for this project was cut short, the long-term benefits of our community-building efforts are evidenced by a continued stream of collaborative projects and co-authored publications.
In 2019, I joined Dr. Rebecca Calisi-Rodríguez’s lab as a data analyst to identify the transcriptional signatures in the brain that are associated with reproduction and parental care. First I created an automated and reproducible workflow to analyze the data. Then, I built an R Shiny app to make the data easy to explore with a friendly graphical user interface. Finally, I added a feature to convert data into sound (a process called data sonification) so that users can listen to the sounds of gene expression changing over time. In addition to making the data more accessible to diverse audiences, this brings us one step closer to listening to the metaphorical “symphony” molecular processes that regulate complex biological processes.
I am fascinated by biology and passionate about supporting my colleagues who are making discoveries and creating resources. I look forward to learning more about the Science Program Officer, Computational Biology position, the core team, and the greater CZI community.
Best,
Rayna M. Harris, PhD