Postdoctoral Fellowship Openings

Dr. Sean Mackey’s Systems Neuroscience and Pain Laboratory at Stanford University is currently accepting applications for a postdoctoral research fellow to advance Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS) in chronic pain. Our lab uses state of the art technologies, including TMS, fMRI, and structural MRI, and has had a growing focus in machine learning techniques applied to neuroimaging, psychophysics and genetics. The primary role will be to advance the use of TMS to understand and treat pain.  Additionally, the candidate will have the opportunity to interact with a large and growing group of interdisciplinary Stanford researchers involved with multiple studies involving acute and chronic pain including:  real-time fMRI control of brain activity, spinal cord fMRI, pharmacologic fMRI, individual difference in pain and cognitive/affective dimensions of pain.

Applicants should have (or anticipate having) a Ph.D. and research background in Cognitive Neuroscience, Neurophysiology, Neuropsychology, or related fields. MD or other graduate-level applicants are also encouraged to apply and should have applicable research experience. Individuals with backgrounds in Electrical Engineering, Physics, Mathematics, Computer Science or similar fields and a strong interest/background in human neuroimaging are also encouraged to apply. Applicants should be experienced at conducting TMS studies, and additional experience with neuroimaging (MRI, fMRI) is preferred.  Some experience with software packages such as SPM, FSL, AFNI, and Matlab is preferred.  Experience with presentation software (such as E-Prime) and other programming languages such as C a plus, but not a requirement. Applicants should also possess strong interpersonal skills and be able to work independently with minimal supervision.

The postdoctoral fellow will be responsible for conducting ongoing TMS projects, analyzing neuroimaging data, as well as planning and conducting future studies. Duties will also include manuscript preparation and management of research assistants. The most successful applicants will have a demonstrated interest in pursuing publication and grant opportunities. Facilities include multiple research-dedicated 3T MR scanners and a 7T full-bore MR scanner, as well as near-infrared spectroscopy and transcranial magnetic stimulation. Salary commensurate with experience. More information about our ongoing studies can be found on the web pages.

The Systems Neuroscience and Pain Laboratory at Stanford University is currently accepting applications for a postdoctoral fellow for neuroimaging research in chronic pain. Funded by NIH (co-PIs Sean Mackey, Gary Glover), this project's overall goal is to characterize pain mechanisms in humans and to develop objective biomarkers of chronic pain. We will be specifically characterizing central sensitization and descending modulation utilizing novel simultaneous neuroimaging technology for spinal cord, brainstem, and brain.

The successful candidate will have unique opportunity to engage in simultaneous spinal cord/brain fMRI and to advance spinal cord fMRI acquisition/analysis and biomarker development. Research plans include:

1. Study of functional connectivity between spinal cord and brain
2. Characterization of corticospinal pain signature
3. Physiological noise modeling in spinal cord
4. Refinement of multiecho spinal cord acquisition and analysis pipeline.

Applicants should hold a PhD and experience conducting fMRI studies and analysis. Previous experience in spinal cord imaging research is an advantage.

The postdoctoral fellow will be responsible for designing experiments, conducting ongoing imaging, analyzing neuroimaging data, planning future studies, searching literature, and writing for publication. The fellow will have opportunity to work within a large group of interdisciplinary Stanford researchers involved with multiple studies ongoing of chronic pain. Additionally, we have a long track record of successfully helping postdoctoral fellows transition to independent grant funding and faculty positions. The Division of Pain Medicine also has an NIH T32 training program. More information can be found on the Stanford Systems Neuroscience and Pain Lab website.

Example and Template of biosketch is available here: biosketch formats. Post-doc applications use non-fellowship template and instructions. Download Letter of Intent template.

The Stanford Division of Pain Medicine Training Program in Pain and Substance Use Disorders is intended to develop postdoctoral trainees’ skills to become independent investigators in the fields of pain, substance abuse disorders, and their intersection.  The training program (1-3 years) incorporates required and elective coursework, mentored research experiences, an individual integrated research project, seminars, and exposure to professional development skills, including grant proposal and manuscript writing. The aim of this program is to develop the next generation of academic leaders in pain and substance abuse disorder to ultimately can better characterize these important conditions and translate discoveries into safe and effective treatments. This program is supported by an NIH National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) T32 training grant. Our program has successfully trained and helped transition multiple postdoctoral fellows into independent research careers.

We are currently accepting applications for trainees interested in applying data science principles and techniques to biomedical datasets. Applicants should be comfortable using coding skills such as SQL, R, and Python to extract data from databases, clean it, and analyze it; as well as have theoretical skills including algorithm implementation/development and data visualization. Experience and interests include designing machine learning pipelines, building web applications/tools, and creating/maintaining visualization dashboards. An example project may involve all skillsets by requiring data extraction, dataset cleaning, implementing a machine learning algorithm (or other statistics), converting the trained algorithm into a useful tool (web application or dashboard), and generating visualizations.

Our T32 also provides tuition support to obtain Stanford Masters in Epidemiology and Clinical Research for those who would benefit from additional training in clinical research.

To be appointed to a T32 research training grant, an individual must be a citizen, a non-citizen national of the United States or must have been lawfully admitted for permanent residence (i.e., in possession of a current, valid Alien Registration Receipt Card I-551, or must be in possession of other legal verification of such status) and not be supported by any other NIH grant at the time of the T32 appointment. Individuals on temporary or student visas are not eligible.

Trainees must have received, as of the beginning date of the appointment, an MD/PhD, MD or PhD or comparable doctoral degree from an accredited domestic or foreign institution. Written certification by an authorized official of the degree-granting institution that all degree requirements have been met, prior to the date training is to begin, is acceptable.

We especially encourage applications from members of under-represented minority groups. Stanford is a non-discriminatory/affirmative action equal opportunity employer.

The Systems Neuroscience & Pain Laboratory at Stanford University (SNAPL) is actively recruiting a postdoctoral fellow who will join our research project on chronic pain. Funded by the National Institute of Health and directed by Professor Sean Mackey, in collaboration with an internationally renowned group of collaborators from the Departments of Computer Sciences, Sleep Medicine, Genetics, Neurosciences and others, our goal is to develop and validate objective diagnostic and prognostic biomarkers of chronic pain. The focus of work for this postdoc will be on the neuroimaging of people with chronic pain using structural and functional MRI techniques.

Our plan is to characterize neurobiological, multiomic, sensory testing, sleep/function actigraphy and other mechanisms underlying chronic pain and use this information to develop objective biomarkers of pain, ultimately, to derive new personalized interventions.

When you join, you will have opportunity to collaborate with top neuroscientists, psychologists, machine learning experts, sleep medicine researchers, genetics experts and pain specialists at Stanford. Additionally, you will have access to cutting-edge fMRI technology; to invent and develop your own related research. Multidisciplinary aspects of this project will allow you to explore diverse chronic pain topics ranging from biomarker design for degenerative conditions to heart rate variability as a simple biomarker for psychological disorders.

We have a strong track record for successfully transitioning postdoctoral fellows to independent grant funding and faculty positions. We can offer NIH T32 training to select candidates. The ideal candidate is a motivated problem solver and innovator who has a neuroscience background, enjoys challenging the paradigms of contemporary research and experimentation, is proficient with computer-aided analysis, and is enthusiastic and passionate about fMRI acquisition.

• fMRI and behavioral data from Healthy Control and patients with musculoskeletal pain,
• Multivariate pattern analysis of spinal cord/brain data for corticospinal biomarker,
• Integration of multimodal biomarkers into composite predictive signatures,

Applicants must have received, as of the beginning date of the appointment, an MD/PhD, MD or PhD or comparable doctoral degree from an accredited domestic or foreign institution. Experience in neuroimaging analysis is a must. Additional experience in any of these is a plus:

1. Cognitive / Affective Neuroscience
2. Computational modeling / Machine Learning / Neural Networks / ICA
3. Chronic pain
4. MATLAB / Python / R / Linux / C
5. SPM / AFNI / FSL / fMRIPrep
   

Find instructions, blank format pages, and sample biosketches here: biosketch formats. Applicants follow non-fellowship templates.  Letter of Intent template is available here.