To monitor the epidemiological dynamics and emergence of new strains, virus samples are usually classified based on nucleotide substitutions, insertions and deletions (indels). Current bioinformatic methods for analysing substitutions are quite mature; however, while indels inform evolutionary studies and medical marker discovery, methods for analysing indels are still in their infancy. The project will study how evaluating phylogenetic indel patterns and viral genome diversity could contribute to vaccine and drug development.

The position is based at the Institute of Computational Life Sciences, Zürich University of Applied Sciences (ZHAW Wädenswil). The PhD student will also be enrolled at the University of Zürich or ETH Zürich. The research group is also part of Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics, which provides additional training and networking opportunities.

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The position will be filled as soon as the suitable candidate is found.

The start is expected in summer 2025 (TBD).