The EPA Environmental Research and Business Support Program has an immediate opening for a Computational Modeling Chemical Researcher with the Office of Research and Development at the EPA’s facility in Raleigh, NC.
The Office of Research and Development (ORD) at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) supports high-quality research to improve the scientific basis for decisions on national environmental issues and help EPA achieve its environmental goals. Research is conducted in a broad range of environmental areas by scientists in EPA laboratories and at universities across the country.
What the EPA project is about
The National Exposure Research Laboratory (NERL) of EPA conducts research to improve the ability of EPA to assess human health and ecological exposure to environmental stressors. Many of the stressors of concern are organic and inorganic chemicals that are in consumer products and articles. To improve EPA’s ability to assess the exposure risk for harmful chemicals, NERL is developing and applying software tools and algorithms to simulate environmental fate and transport, understand human activity patterns, evaluate exposure potential, and estimate internal dose.
What you will be doing
As part of the EPA team, you will work within a multi-disciplinary research team and provide technical and research support for the development of computational models of exposure to chemicals in occupational settings.
Required skills
Demonstrated successful completion of at least 12 hours of coursework in computer science, mathematics, and/or statistics;
Demonstrated education and/or experience in scientific computing using an interpreter-based language (e.g., Python, R, MATLAB, etc.);
Demonstrated ability to collaborate with others as part of a team.
Desired skills
Education and/or experience in developing and querying relational databases; and
Education and/or experience with statistical modeling and/or machine learning methods (both supervised and unsupervised).
How you will apply your skills
Identification, collection, and curation of occupational exposure data that will be used to evaluate and parameterize occupational exposure models;
Development and implementation of algorithms in Python or R for prediction of human exposures in occupational settings; and
Analysis and evaluation of models against reported and measured occupational exposure values.
Communications-related duties shall include:
Compilation and summarization of data and literature references into organized electronic files;
Participation in team discussions on progress and planned activities;
Interaction with other team members of the research team as well as EPA scientist;
Visualization of data and modeling results; and
Communication of results via presentations(s), written reports, and peer-reviewed publications.
Location: This job will be located at EPA’s Research Triangle Park facility in Raleigh-Durham, NC.
Salary: Selected applicant will become a temporary employee of ORAU and will receive an hourly wage of $41.63 for hours worked.
Hours: Full time
Travel: Occasional overnight travel may be required.
Expected start date: This position is full-time and expected to begin in May 2019. The selected applicant will be temporary employees of ORAU working as a contractor to EPA. The initial contract period is through May 14, 2020.
Working conditions:
You will be supervised by a mentor who will provide day-to-day direction, as well as coach, advise and counsel the student, and review your work. The mentor for this position will be a federal EPA employee.
This position will involve work in an administrative setting and is not expected to involve exposure to hazardous elements.
Have earned a PhD degree in engineering, statistics, data science/analytics, or a closely related field of study from an accredited university within the last 24 months and
Be a citizen of the United States of America or a Legal Permanent Resident.
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