Open Science Fellow

Job Description

Job Description

Upgrading Scientific Dialogue

UPDATE : the deadline has been extended to December 31, 2024. We are moving to semiannual application review cycles, and we expect the next deadline to be June 30, 2025.

Astera is committed to accelerating scientific progress by tackling bottlenecks in scientific communication. Toward that end, we support experimentation with new information tools that will transform scientific dialogue and enable researchers to openly share their data.

We are looking for creative, high-agency entrepreneurs who seek to foster more interactive information exchange in the life sciences.

Opportunity :

Astera’s Open Science Fellow program supports dedicated innovators who want to unlock new tools for scientific publishing.

Such tools could be new technologies, workflows, or other projects.

Selected fellows will carry out a one-year, full-time fellowship at Astera. In addition to the fellow’s salary, we will consider a proposed budget of up to $350,000 to cover resources for the fellow, including other potential teammates.

Open Science Fellows will work to create a spin-out organization or company, and fellows will convene in Berkeley, CA for 4 on-site weeks per year.

In addition to financial support, Astera’s Fellowship program will also provide guidance for fellows as they envision and test actionable, out-of-the-box ideas.

In addition to regular meetings with the Program Director, the fellowship consists of cohort calls where fellows share experiences and learn from guest speakers.

Periodically, fellows are brought to Berkeley, CA for on-site visits (up to 4 weeks per year) that include strategic planning exercises and networking opportunities.

We will connect open science fellows with advisors; we believe that learning and building together with active researchers and open science leaders will be critical for understanding user needs and incorporating historical lessons.

We will also help identify team members who can complement the fellow’s skills and experience.

A major goal of the program is to create knowledge about how to make projects in this space successful, so we require fellows to publicly share their learnings as part of a reporting structure.

Who are we looking for?

Ideal candidates are high-agency creators with the ability to identify and tackle challenges needed to launch a tool, service, or platform.

We want to identify collaborative candidates who are eager to tackle the challenges of improving and scaling scientific dialogue beyond traditional academic communities.

We encourage candidates who bring a unique skillset and are willing to rapidly iterate on the basis of key constraints and user needs.

Ideal projects are at stages of development early enough to preclude support by other mechanisms.

Examples of people who would be qualified to be an Open Science Fellow, including but not limited to :

Scientists with a plan to build a tool that accelerates sharing scientific knowledge, and can assemble a team with appropriate technical skills to scale it.

Product designers who have an idea for an innovation that will catalyze a new era in scientific information exchange.

Software engineers or platform builders who want to open up new possibilities for innovation by reinventing the underlying infrastructure for sharing data and other scientific information.

Entrepreneurs with deep user experience and ideas for tools that would lower the barrier to entry and make open science practices easier to adopt.

To apply to be an Open Science Fellow :

Please attach your resume or CV.

Include a cover letter (2 pages max) that briefly describes the following :

Your professional background (If applicable, we would like to know about previous entrepreneurial experience, relevant organizations you may have started, and / or milestones you have achieved so far)

A problem in communication among scientists

Your proposed solution to this problem (We expect that your ideas are a starting point for future iterations. Please let us know explicitly if you are flexible and willing to collaboratively shape your idea prior to starting a potential fellowship at Astera)

The landscape of competitive products and services, and how your solution differs

Your skills, gaps in your skills that you have identified, and how these gaps might be complemented by team members or future team members.

We value your honest self-assessment.

Openness of code, data, and other resources is strongly preferred. If you believe that keeping some resources proprietary is necessary for the success of your project, please explain what you intend to keep proprietary, how doing so would increase your project's value for the public good, and whether making it open instead necessarily precludes that impact.

Quarterly milestones you would like to achieve in a 1-year fellowship

Budget (include major expense categories (compute costs, equipment, travel, etc)and personnel costs broken down by individual employees / contractors)

Whether you prefer to be on-site, remote, or hybrid.

Qualified candidates will be advanced based on the following criteria :

Potential of individual

Importance of problem

Impact of solution

Alignment with FAIR principles

Salary : $125,00-200,000 USD

$125,00-200,000 USD

Salary will be commensurate with expertise and experience.

If you are a creative, collaborative, high-agency entrepreneur with a product mindset and the drive to accommodate user needs, we’re looking for you!

The next application deadline is December 31, 2024. Please understand that we cannot provide preliminary feedback on your application.

The call remains open if this page is visible.

Contact Open Science Program Director Jessica Polka at [email protected] with any questions.

Compensation Range : $125K - $200K