Life at Earlham Institute
We believe that our people are our greatest asset, and we want you to have the freedom to achieve your very best work here.
Applications are invited for a Senior Developer to join the Research Faculty at the Earlham Institute, based in Norwich, UK.
Background:
Help build the platform behind some of the largest biodiversity genomics programmes ever attempted.
COPO (Collaborative OPen Omics) is a Django-based metadata brokering platform developed at the Earlham Institute. It helps researchers describe, manage and publish biological data in line with the FAIR principles (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, Reusable). COPO captures standards-compliant metadata and brokers submissions to public repositories including the European Nucleotide Archive (ENA), BioSamples, Zenodo and DataCite, and packages research outputs as RO-Crates.
COPO is the metadata backbone for projects of international scientific significance, including the Darwin Tree of Life programme and Biodiversity Genomics Europe, supporting the description and submission of samples, sequencing data and derived analyses from biodiversity genomics at scale.
The role:
We are seeking a talented Senior Developer to deliver the next phase of COPO's evolution.
The work will evolve COPO's existing Python/Django codebase, establishing a cleaner, more maintainable architecture with improved APIs and user-facing components. You will enhance the platform's ability to support new use cases and integrations while preserving the metadata handling excellence that makes COPO invaluable to the research community.
Working across the full technology stack, you will develop dashboards, data portals, APIs and the services that support COPO's metadata validation, curation and submission workflows. Data visualisation and API design sit at the heart of the role, transforming complex, multi-source scientific metadata into clear, reliable and well-documented interfaces that researchers can depend on.
Ideal candidate:
The ideal candidate will have a degree (or equivalent professional/practical experience) in computer science, software engineering, bioinformatics or a related discipline.
You will have experience delivering full-stack web applications using modern frontend and backend technologies, with a strong track record in designing, building and documenting RESTful APIs. Comfortable working in collaborative engineering environments, you will be confident with version control, code review practices, containerisation and CI/CD workflows.
The post holder will have a talent for turning complex or ambiguous requirements into intuitive, user-focused solutions, and an appreciation of FAIR data principles, ontologies or controlled vocabularies.
Experience with data visualisation and dashboard development, scientific data or metadata standards, cloud or research-computing environments, or domains such as genomics, biodiversity or ecology would be advantageous.
Additional information:
Salary on appointment will be within the range £47,450 to £58,000 per annum depending on qualifications and experience. This is a full-time post for a contract until 31 August 2028.
This role does not meet the full salary requirements set by UKVI to allow for visa sponsorship. However, some individuals may still be eligible for visa sponsorship depending on their personal circumstances. If you require visa sponsorship, please click here to find out if you qualify before applying.
Please note, the occupation code for this role is 2134, which is not on the immigration salary list.
As a Disability Confident employer, we guarantee to offer an interview to all disabled applicants who meet the essential criteria for this vacancy.
The closing date for applications will be 19 August 2026.
