Job Description

UE07: £41,064.00 - £48,822.00 Per Annum.

College of Science and Engineering / School of Informatics / Institute for Machine Learning.

Full Time - 35 Hours per week.

Fixed Term Contract, if applicable: 01/07/2026 – 31/03/2028 - 21 months.

We are looking for a Postdoctoral Researcher in Biomedical Natural Language Processing.

The Opportunity:

Together we can do great things. Be part of something bigger.

With roles from hospitality to research, there’s a career for everyone at the University of Edinburgh. We can offer opportunities for you to develop in your career and make a real difference in the communities around us while contributing to the world at large. 

The University of Edinburgh is a world-class organisation. We look for the best in the field across all disciplines and provide a working environment where academics can develop their careers and passion for their chosen subject area. We offer the full range of academic roles and have a genuine focus on our student’s performance and wellbeing.

Improving diagnosis for rare genetic diseases is a critical challenge, requiring innovative approaches to extract and interpret complex biological and clinical information. As part of the Welcome Trust funded PARADIGM project, an initiative aiming to transform genomic medicine by identifying new causes of monogenic disease and developing annotated resources for the scientific community. This role will focus on advancing biomedical natural language processing (NLP) to enhance variant-phenotype mapping, gene-disease models, and clinical decision support.

The successful candidate will collaborate with academics, curators, clinical scientists, clinicians, and patient groups to identify practical applications of NLP in real-world scenarios. Key responsibilities include developing novel NLP approaches to extract phenotypic information from unstructured data (e.g., literature, EHRs, clinical notes), creating domain-specific text summarisation tools, and integrating these technologies into PARADIGM’s broader research goals. The role also involves proactively disseminating work through national and international collaborations, ensuring explainable AI/ML for clinical use, and supporting students through mentorship and knowledge-sharing activities.

This position offers the opportunity to contribute to cutting-edge research, work in the Biomedical Informatics Group, a multidisciplinary team in the School of Informatics, and shape the future of genomic medicine.

Your skills and attributes for success:

Essential Skills & Experience:

• PhD (or equivalent) in a relevant field (e.g., Natural Language Processing, Bioinformatics, Computational Biology, or related disciplines).
• Demonstrated expertise in biomedical NLP, including experience with text mining, knowledge extraction, or clinical NLP,
• Strong programming skills in Python and familiarity with NLP toolkits.
• Experience with large language models (LLMs) and their fine-tuning for domain-specific tasks.
• Ability to work collaboratively within interdisciplinary teams (academics, clinicians, curators, etc.) and communicate complex technical concepts clearly.
• Experience with scientific writing, including the ability to publish in peer-reviewed journals and present research findings at conferences.

Desirable Skills & Experience:

• Knowledge of genetic disease biology, phenotypic data, or clinical workflows (e.g., EHRs, patient registries)
• Experience with retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) systems or prompt engineering for NLP tasks.
• Familiarity with agentic systems or autonomous workflows for data processing and analysis.
• Experience with literature analysis, including the use of tools for full-text document retrieval.
• Familiarity with variant-phenotype mapping, gene-disease model creation, or computational phenomics.
• Experience with explainable AI/ML for clinical decision support or open-source software development.

Contact details for enquiries: Ian.Simpson@ed.ac.uk

This post is full-time (35 hours per week); however, we are also open to considering requests for hybrid working (on a non-contractual basis) that combines a mix of remote and regular on-campus working.

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How to apply:

Please include the following documents in your application:

• CV
• Cover letter

As a valued member of our team, you can expect:

• A competitive salary.
• An exciting, positive, creative, challenging and rewarding place to work.
• To be part of a diverse and vibrant international community.
• Comprehensive Staff Benefits, including generous annual leave entitlement, a defined benefits pension scheme, a wide range of staff discounts, family-friendly initiatives, and flexible work options. Check out the full list on our staff benefits page (opens in a new tab) and use our reward calculator to discover the value of your pay and benefits.

Championing equality, diversity, and inclusion:

The University of Edinburgh holds a Silver Athena SWAN award in recognition of our commitment to advance gender equality in higher education. We are members of the Race Equality Charter, and we are also Stonewall Scotland Diversity Champions, actively promoting LGBT equality.

Prior to any employment commencing with the University, you will be required to evidence your right to work in the UK. Further information is available on our right to work webpages (opens new browser tab).

The University may be able to sponsor the employment of international workers in this role.  This will depend on a number of factors specific to the successful applicant.

Key dates to note:

The closing date for applications is 19 June 2026.

Interviews will be held after the closing date.

If invited for interview you will be required to evidence your right to work in the UK. Further information is available on our right to work webpages (opens new browser tab)

Unless stated otherwise the closing time for applications is 11:59pm GMT. If you are applying outside the UK, the closing time on our adverts automatically adjusts to your browsers local time zone. 

As a world-leading research-intensive University, we are here to address tomorrow’s greatest challenges. Between now and 2030 we will do that with a values-led approach to teaching, research and innovation, and through the strength of our relationships, both locally and globally.