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What They Do
About This Career
Applies 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. Applies bioinformatics tools to visualize, analyze, manipulate or interpret molecular data. May build and maintain databases for processing and analyzing genomic or other biological information.
This career is part of the Government and Public Administration cluster Planning pathway.
A person in this career:
- Analyzes or manipulates bioinformatics data using software packages, statistical applications, or data mining techniques.
- Extends existing software programs, web-based interactive tools, or database queries as sequence management and analysis needs evolve.
- Maintains awareness of new and emerging computational methods and technologies.
- Conducts quality analyses of data inputs and resulting analyses or predictions.
- Enters or retrieves information from structural databases, protein sequence motif databases, mutation databases, genomic databases or gene expression databases.
- Develops or maintains applications that process biologically based data into searchable databases for purposes of analysis, calculation, or presentation.
- Participates in the preparation of reports or scientific publications.
- Confers with researchers, clinicians, or information technology staff to determine data needs and programming requirements and to provide assistance with database-related research activities.
- Writes computer programs or scripts to be used in querying databases.
- Documents all database changes, modifications, or problems.
Working Conditions and Physical Demands
People who do this job report that:
- You would sit most of the time. There's some walking and standing. You may have to lift and carry things like books, papers or tools weighing 10 lbs. or less.
- Work in this occupation requires being inside most of the time
- Work in this occupation involves sitting more than one-third of the time
Working in this career involves (physical activities):
- Seeing clearly up close
- Speaking clearly enough to be able to be understood by others
- Identifying and understanding the speech of another person
Work Hours and Travel
- Regular working hours and limited travel
Specialty and Similar Careers
Careers that are more detailed or close to this career:
- Research Scientist
- Bioinformatics Analyst
- Bioinformatics Specialist — Processes the biological information at the molecular level by using computers, and focuses on managing and analyzing the enormous amount of data that is being created in molecular and cellular biology, genomics and biomedicine.
- Biotechnician — Works with biologists studying living organisms and helps maintain, set up and operate laboratory equipment; makes observations, calculating and recording results; and analyzes organic substances, such as blood, food and drugs.
- Museum Informatics Specialist
- Scientific Informatics Analyst
Every year the U.S. Department of Labor conducts national surveys of wage data by occupation in every state and in all industry divisions. These surveys are conducted through the Occupational Employment Statistics (OES) program.
The statistics collected for one year are published the next fall. For example, 2013 wage information was published in the fall of 2014.
There are over 800 occupations in the surveys, and these occupations cover the entire U.S. labor market. The surveys ask for reports in a scale of ranges for both hourly wages and annual wages.
In many cases, these occupations are broad enough to cover many more detailed specialties of an occupation. A specific occupation may be included in a broader occupational category for which labor market data is available. When you look at the statistics for a broad category, be aware that the salary data for a specific career may differ.
For more details about how wage information is collected and calculated by the U.S. Department of Labor, visit their website at http://www.bls.gov/bls/blswage.htm.
Every year the U.S. Department of Labor conducts a national survey of over 400,000
employers in every state and in all industry divisions. This survey is conducted
through the Occupational Employment Statistics (OES) program. Every other year the
department publishes outlook information based on these surveys.
Each outlook period covers 10 years. For example, in 2003 the outlook information
was published for 2004-2014. Employers are asked to report the number of employees
in about 770 different occupations that cover the entire U.S. labor market.
From this information, staffing patterns for different industries are established.
Industry growth is projected into the future based on past trends and current economic
conditions. Industry staffing patterns are then applied to the industry projections
to obtain occupational projections.
In many cases, these occupations are broad enough to cover many more detailed specialties
of an occupation. A specific occupation may be included in a broader occupational
category for which labor market data is available. When you look at the statistics
for a broad category, be aware that the employment data for a specific field may
differ.
For more details about how employment information is collected and calculated by
the U.S. Department of Labor, visit their website at http://stats.bls.gov/news.release/ocwage.tn.htm.
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