Bioinformatics Technicians
SOC: 43-9111.01

Description:

Apply principles and methods of bioinformatics to assist scientists in areas such as pharmaceuticals, medical technology, biotechnology, computational biology, proteomics, computer information science, biology and medical informatics. Apply bioinformatics tools to visualize, analyze, manipulate or interpret molecular data. May build and maintain databases for processing and analyzing genomic or other biological information.

National Salary Information:

Hourly Statistics:

Annual Statistics:

Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics 2015 wage data.

Employment Projections:

Employment (2014):
16,600 employed

Projected (2024):
14,800 employed

Projected growth (2014-2024)


Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics 2015 2014-2024 employment projections external site. "Projected growth" represents the estimated change in total employment over the projections period (2014-2024). "Projected job openings" represent openings due to growth and replacement.

Alternate Titles:

  • Assistant Research Scientist
  • Bioinformatics Analyst
  • Bioinformatics Assistant
  • Bioinformatics Developer
  • Bioinformatics Research Technician
  • Bioinformatics Specialist
  • Bioinformatics Technician
  • Biometrics Technician
  • Biotechnician
  • Data Analyst
  • Data Technician
  • Database Technician
  • Informatics Developer
  • Log Data Technician
  • Museum Informatics Specialist
  • Research Assistant
  • Scientific Informatics Analyst

    • Job Zone Four: Considerable Preparation Needed

    Experience:

    A considerable amount of work-related skill, knowledge, or experience is needed for these occupations. For example, an accountant must complete four years of college and work for several years in accounting to be considered qualified.

    Education:

    Most of these occupations require a four-year bachelor's degree, but some do not.

    Job Training:

    Employees in these occupations usually need several years of work-related experience, on-the-job training, and/or vocational training.

    Required Skills:

  • Reading Comprehension
  • Active Listening
  • Writing
  • Speaking
  • Mathematics
  • Science
  • Critical Thinking
  • Active Learning
  • Learning Strategies
  • Monitoring
  • Social Perceptiveness
  • Coordination
  • Persuasion
  • Negotiation
  • Instructing
  • Service Orientation
  • Complex Problem Solving
  • Operations Analysis
  • Technology Design
  • Programming
  • Operation Monitoring
  • Quality Control Analysis
  • Judgment and Decision Making
  • Systems Analysis
  • Systems Evaluation
  • Time Management
  • Management of Financial Resources
  • Management of Material Resources
  • Management of Personnel Resources

    • Knowledge Used:

  • Administration and Management
  • Clerical
  • Sales and Marketing
  • Customer and Personal Service
  • Personnel and Human Resources
  • Production and Processing
  • Computers and Electronics
  • Engineering and Technology
  • Design
  • Mechanical
  • Mathematics
  • Physics
  • Chemistry
  • Biology
  • Psychology
  • Geography
  • Medicine and Dentistry
  • Education and Training
  • English Language
  • Public Safety and Security
  • Law and Government
  • Telecommunications
  • Communications and Media

    • Tasks:

  • Develop or maintain applications that process biologically based data into searchable databases for purposes of analysis, calculation, or presentation.
  • Enter or retrieve information from structural databases, protein sequence motif databases, mutation databases, genomic databases or gene expression databases.
  • Monitor database performance and perform any necessary maintenance, upgrades, or repairs.
  • Analyze or manipulate bioinformatics data using software packages, statistical applications, or data mining techniques.
  • Confer with researchers, clinicians, or information technology staff to determine data needs and programming requirements and to provide assistance with database-related research activities.
  • Create data management or error-checking procedures and user manuals.
  • Design or implement web-based tools for querying large-scale biological databases.
  • Develop or apply data mining and machine learning algorithms.
  • Document all database changes, modifications, or problems.
  • Extend existing software programs, web-based interactive tools, or database queries as sequence management and analysis needs evolve.
  • Maintain awareness of new and emerging computational methods and technologies.
  • Participate in the preparation of reports or scientific publications.
  • Test new or updated software or tools and provide feedback to developers.
  • Train bioinformatics staff or researchers in the use of databases.
  • Write computer programs or scripts to be used in querying databases.
  • Conduct quality analyses of data inputs and resulting analyses or predictions.
  • Confer with database users about project timelines and changes.
  • Package bioinformatics data for submission to public repositories.
  • Perform routine system administrative functions such as troubleshooting, back-ups, and upgrades.

    • Tools & Technology:

  • Computer clusters
  • Computer workstation setups
  • Desktop computers
  • High throughput screening HTS systems
  • Network file servers
  • Nuclear magnetic resonance NMR spectrometers
  • Semiconductor-based sequencers
  • Web servers
  • Apache Subversion
  • Atlassian Bamboo
  • Basic Local Alignment Search Tool BLAST
  • Bioconductor
  • Bowtie
  • Burrows-Wheeler Aligner BWA
  • C
  • C++
  • ClustalW
  • Cufflinks
  • Genome Analysis ToolKit GATK
  • GENSCAN
  • Git
  • Hypertext markup language HTML
  • Jenkins CI
  • Life Technologies Ion Reporter Software
  • Linux
  • MySQL software
  • Oracle Java
  • PHYLIP
  • Practical extraction and reporting language Perl
  • Python
  • R
  • Ruby
  • The MathWorks MATLAB
  • TopHat
  • Web browser software

    • office and administrative support

    industry stats

    SOC: 43-0000

    Total Employed: 21,846,420

    Average Annual Salary: $36,330