- Job title: Research Associate
- Department: Life Sciences
- Salary: Starting from £38,784, rising to £46,049
- Grade: Grade 7
- Contract Type: Full Time, Fixed Term
- Placed on: Tuesday 05 May 2026
- Closing date: Wednesday 20 May 2026
- Interview date: To be confirmed
- Reference: SS13612
- Special Conditions: Lone working
- Guidance for International Applicants
About the role
We are seeking a highly motivated postdoctoral researcher to join a NERC funded project to develop novel bacteriophage-based tools for microbial source tracking. The project is a collaboration between the Universities of Bath, Brighton, Sheffield and the Environment Agency and the successful candidate will join a highly supportive and collegiate team working across these institutions. This role, based at the University of Bath, will focus on the analysis of viral metagenomic data to identify human gut associated bacteriophage sequences that can be exploited to monitor water quality. In particular the role will involve:
- Supporting the development of methods for generating viral metagenomes from wastewater samples
- Analysis of metagenomes and identification of bacteriophage signatures with high diagnostic potential for feacal pollution
- Development of algorithms and pipelines to detect faecal pollution in water samples based on viral metagenome analysis
- Supporting the validation of new source tracking tools and evaluating performance against existing methods.
About you
Applicants must have a PhD (or be close to completion/have equivalent experience) in relevant disciplines, and experience with analysis of bacterial and bacteriophage sequence data. Experience in microbial ecology and/or environmental microbiology related to pollution and management of surface waters is also desirable but not essential.
Further information
This role is offered on a full time (36.5 hours per week) fixed term basis with a proposed start date of July 2026 for a duration of 24 months.
For an informal discussion regarding the role please contact Brian Jones at bvj20@bath.ac.uk.
We consider ourselves to be a university where difference is celebrated, respected and encouraged. We have an excellent international reputation with staff from over 60 different nations and have made a positive commitment towards gender equity and intersectionality receiving a Silver Athena SWAN award. We truly believe that diversity of experience, perspectives, and backgrounds will lead to a better environment for our employees and students and encourage applications from all genders, backgrounds, and communities, particularly from under-represented groups, and value the positive impact that will have on the university. We are committed to maintaining a safe and secure environment for our students, staff, and community by reinforcing our Safer Recruitment commitment.
We’re very proud to be a signatory of the Armed Forces Covenant. an accredited Disability Confident Leader; autism friendly university, committed to building disability confidence and supporting disabled staff.
What we can offer you
We’re continually expanding our benefits package to better support you and enhance your experience with us and the below is just an example of some of the many great benefits we offer:
- Free counselling services through Health Assured
- Cycle to work scheme
- Electric vehicle salary sacrifice scheme
- Staff discount at Team Bath gym
- Staff discounts on postgraduate tuition fees
- Staff discount on language courses
- Generous employer contributory pension schemes
- Generous annual leave allowance with an additional 5 discretionary days so that you can enjoy a positive work life balance
- A wide range of personal and professional development opportunities including Apprenticeships, LinkedIn Learning and more
- Free entry to the Holburne Museum in Bath
- Local discounts and more
- A family-friendly workplace
- An excellent reward package that recognises the talents of our diverse workforce
- Relocation allowance
- Visa reimbursement and Interest-Free Loan to help with the cost of some immigration expenses
Find out more about our benefits and watch the video to hear from our staff about what makes the University of Bath a great place to work as well as following us X and LinkedIn.
Further details:
