As the title suggest, what are the fields with the biggest demand for bioinformaticists? There's pretty much a shortage of experienced bioinformatcists in every field but which ones are hardest hit? Proteomics? Transcriptomics? Pharmocogenetics?
Has there been any research on this question?
From my point of view, bioimage informatics is the growing field at the moment. There's more demand now from omics people with single cell technologies. You want to know what the cell you sequenced was doing when you harvested it: take some fluorescence images before doing the sequencing. You want transcriptomics info for cells with a particular phenotype: do some single molecule fluorescence in situ hybridization (smFISH) transcriptomics. With mass spectrometry imaging, you can also now go for some metabolomics profile of a single cell.
Best way to find out is to look at job postings in bioinformatics. How many are then in certain fields? Which ones pay the most?
Aren't there any industry surveys? I know the American Chemical Society does yearly (or every two years) surveys on what individuals with certain specs make in this and that part of the country. They break it down by fields and then years of experience providing means and ranges for positions. I wonder if AAPS (American Assoc.of Pharma. Scientists) do the same? I used to keep up with them in the past
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I would say it's probably easier to find a job if you sell yourself as a bioinformatics engineer rather than a bioinformatics scientist - i.e. HPC, workflows, cloud, etc. Often the salary structure is better on that side as well.
So more CS than biology. Makes sense, since that applies in general as well.
To some degree. What bioinformatics doesnt need is more CS grads thinking they can turn up with “trendy tool X” and just ‘solve’ biology...
I've moved the question to a Forum post, which is more appropriate for these discussions.
I think you should tell us why you're asking this question and what your personal interest is, so any guidance can address that question. Also, tell us what you've discovered in your research on this topic that has you saying "There's pretty much a shortage of experienced bioinformatcists[sic] in every field"
Hi, I've gotten into bioinformatics recently and am currently exploring what fields to go deep into. The impression of the shortage comes from other biologists mostly, but an anecdote isn't data so I'm hoping to find some research to confirm/deny this. As for interest, I've started looking into bacterial genomics recently and with antimicrobial resistance on the rise, I think it's a promising field.
Edit: And long reads seems like it has a lot of potential.
It sort of depends what distinctions you’re drawing between disciplines.
Long read tech is absolutely the headline in Bioinformatics in general at the moment (IMHO), but I wouldn’t say thats a discipline in itself, since bioinformaticians from all walks are hitting it hard.
I couldnt tell you which fields are lacking. All of them need more people - but I do agree with your assessment that bioinformatics is crying out for talented biologists who can code. Oftentimes, the real biological understanding/intuition is missing from bioinformatics papers etc.
It might not seem super scientific or objective, but the data doesn’t always have all the answers. Sometimes a little bench side intuition has its place.
Next to the fields having a demand for well trained bioinformaticians, please also follow your interests and skills.
If you are interested in a certain field - showing having less open positions at the moment - , you should nevertheless follow that. Meaning if you are good in something, have a lot of knowledge, and enthusiasm, you will find good jobs.