FAIR Data Expert

As an internationally recognized research center, VITO accelerates the transition to a sustainable world. Our world-class Environment & Health team puts data and scientific innovation at the service of a healthier society. To enable cutting-edge research on the links between the environment and our health, we develop scientific applications, data platforms, and data catalogues. We provide services to both data owners and data users across Europe, helping them to make data interoperable and to facilitate data reuse.

We are looking for a FAIR Data Expert to lead the scientific development and application of FAIR data approaches for environmental health research. You will work at the intersection of data science, environmental health and research methodology, developing innovative ways to make complex data suitable for interdisciplinary research and reuse. You will help shape European data infrastructures with long-term scientific and societal impact. You will play a pivotal role in enabling high-quality, FAIR data-driven research by collaborating with researchers, data stewards, domain experts, and technical teams to make complex datasets findable, accessible, interoperable, trustworthy, and reusable across organizations, disciplines, and borders. You will translate scientific needs into practical solutions that make research data FAIR. You lead the development and implementation of semantic resources.

Your responsibilities:

• You lead the implementation of the FAIR data principles in our research data infrastructure for personal exposure and health data. You develop, maintain, and govern the necessary FAIR enabling resources and FAIR supporting resources, e.g. data schemas, data models, controlled vocabularies, ontologies, persistent identifier strategies - in collaboration with our domain experts, data stewards, data engineers, and external partners.
• You contribute to the design and execution of research and innovation projects in environmental health. You explore how heterogeneous data can be combined and reused to address scientific questions, assess data quality and fitness of reuse, and develop and validate FAIR and interoperable data approaches in concrete research applications.
• You are an ambassador for FAIR data. You facilitate and drive the adoption of the FAIR data infrastructure among colleagues and external partners by developing user-oriented resources, guidance, training, and encouragement.
• You monitor scientific and policy developments in the European research and health data landscape, including EHDS and EOSC. You assess their relevance for environmental health research, you translate emerging standards and opportunities into actionable recommendations, and you help seize funding opportunities.
• You help ensure that data infrastructures comply with relevant regulations (e.g. GDPR) and internal policies, working closely with VITO’s data protection and security experts.
• You contribute to research and innovation proposals and help develop new project ideas and funding opportunities in the field of FAIR environmental health data.
• You disseminate research results through scientific publications, reports, conference contributions, training, and participation in European research communities.
• You shape how environmental health data is shared and reused across Europe, through active participation in initiatives such as PARC, the European Partnership for the Assessment of Risks from Chemicals (https://www.eu-parc.eu/) and in EIRENE, the European Research Infrastructure for the human exposome (https://eirene.eu/).

• You hold a Master degree in data science, bioinformatics, computational biology, epidemiology, environmental or health sciences, or a related scientific field. Candidates with a background in information technology are also eligible when combined with demonstrable experience in research data and scientific collaboration. A PhD or comparable research experience is an asset.
• You have at least 2 years of hands-on experience applying the FAIR data principles in a research context. You know how to develop and implement semantic interoperability, vocabularies, ontologies, data schemas, and other FAIR Enabling Resources.
• You can demonstrate experience in collaborating with teams or partners with diverse backgrounds, including domain experts and data engineers. Based on your collaborations with domain experts, you understand how scientific data are collected, curated, documented, harmonized, analysed, and reused. You have worked with data engineers on the implementation of APIs, workflows, and data calculation pipelines.
• You have a solid technical understanding of the linked data technology stack and modern software engineering practices, enabling you to effectively discuss technical concepts and collaborate with our data and software engineers
• You communicate clearly to scientific, technical, and generic audiences to drive adoption and implementation of FAIR data concepts.
• You have a strong scientific mindset. You can translate scientific questions into data requirements and methodological approaches. You can critically evaluate the quality, relevance and fitness for use of data, synthesize available evidence, identify knowledge and data gaps, and translate complex scientific challenges into robust recommendations or research solutions.
• You have experience with acquiring research funding.
• Experience with any of the following is considered an asset:
• The (re)use of personal data,
• Distributed or federated data infrastructures and related web services,
• Experience with scientific programming languages, such as Python or R
• Linked data concepts & technologies, such as RDF, OWL or SPARQL
• Health research data
• The European data landscape, including EHDS and EOSC

Offer

• We operate in an activity‑based way, meaning your work activities guide where you work. Our headquarters is located in Mol, where we regularly work and meet as a team. You also have the possibility to work from home or from one of our satellite offices in Antwerp, Genk, Ghent, Leuven, Kortrijk or Ostend.
• A competitive salary with a range of benefits, including allowances, insurance, and a modular package of holidays.
• Innovation is our asset, so it goes without saying that we offer our employees the opportunity to take additional training courses and stay up to date in their field of expertise. You always get the opportunity to broaden your knowledge, for example on FAIR or linked data technologies.
• You will be part of an organization with an international reputation, known for its advanced technological research and scientific consultancy.
• With us, you will contribute directly to sustainable developments at local, national, and global level through your innovative applications. You provide an answer to today’s societal challenges.
• Moreover, at VITO we attach great importance to work-life balance. We do this by being flexible, depending on your specific needs.