About this role
Düsseldorf University Hospital (UKD) is the largest hospital in the state capital and one of the most important medical centers in North Rhine-Westphalia. The 9,300 employees at UKD and its subsidiaries are committed to treating over 45,000 inpatients and 270,000 outpatients every year. The UKD stands for international excellence in patient care, research and teaching, as well as for innovative and safe diagnostics, therapy and prevention. Patients benefit from the intensive interdisciplinary cooperation between the 60 clinics and institutes. The particular strength of the University Hospital is the close integration of clinical and research work for the safe application of new methods. Tomorrow's medicine is being created at the UKD. Every day. As part of a joint initiative organized by the Graduate School (integrated Research Training Group, iRTG) of the German Research Foundation (DFG)-funded Collaborative Research Center (CRC) 1774 “Cardio-Diabetes Crosstalk (CARDDIAB),” we are seeking, starting October 1, 2026, a doctoral researcher (m/f/d) This is a three-year fixed-term training position in accordance with the German Act on Fixed-Term Academic Contracts (WissZeitVG, pursuant to Section §2(1)). About the CRC 1774 The CRC 1774 investigates how key metabolic “promoter organs”-adipose tissue, bone marrow, the gut, and the liver-communicate with the cardiovascular system and thereby influence the progression from health through prediabetes and type 2 diabetes to cardiovascular diseases. By combining comprehensively characterized patient cohorts with state-of-the-art multi-omics technologies, innovative imaging techniques, and methods from data science and artificial intelligence, the project aims to decipher the mechanisms underlying cardiometabolic diseases and develop new approaches for precision medicine at the interface of diabetology and cardiology. Doctoral students work on interdisciplinary research projects spanning basic, translational, and clinical research. The focus is on organ-to-organ communication, metabolic regulation, inflammatory processes, cellular energy metabolism, and cardiovascular complications of diabetes within a highly collaborative and international research environment. Doctoral Project: As part of your doctoral project, you will integrate metabolic imaging with multi-omics data, including microbiome sequencing, transcriptomics, proteomics, lipidomics, metabolomics, and exosome profiling. Using these integrated datasets, you will develop genome-wide metabolic models (GEMs) as well as machine learning-based analysis pipelines aimed at identifying flux-based biomarkers for cardiovascular complications. Master’s degree in bioinformatics, computational biology, computer science, systems biology, data science, or a related field Strong interest in the analysis of multi-omics data, metabolism, and translational biomedical research Experience in programming and statistical data analysis, preferably in C/C++, Rust, Java, R, or Python Experience analyzing at least some of the following data types: RNA-Seq, metagenomics, proteomics, lipidomics, metabolomics, or datasets related to extracellular vesicles/exosomes Interest in or prior knowledge of constraint-based modeling or genome-level metabolic models Excellent communication skills in English Outstanding academic performance and a strong motivation for scientific work Enthusiasm for the interdisciplinary research program of CRC 1774 Active participation in the structured training program and the scientific activities of the Integrated Graduate School Willingness to engage in interdisciplinary collaboration and academic exchange within the CRC 1774 Timely production of scholarly publications and the doctoral dissertation Compliance with the DFG guidelines for ensuring good scientific practice and the principles of responsible research Compensation is provided in accordance with the provisions of the TV-L (Collective Bargaining Agree...