Research Software Professional at IIASA, Austria

The IIASA Energy, Climate, and Environment (ECE) Program is one of the leading scientific research institutions in the domain of integrated assessment of climate change and the systems transition to implement the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). In addition to its own high-impact research, ECE provides a range of services to the broader research community.

The IIASA Energy, Climate, and Environment (ECE) Program is one of the leading scientific research institutions in the domain of integrated assessment of climate change and the systems transition to implement the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). In addition to its own high-impact research, ECE provides a range of services to the broader research community.

The ECE program recently established the research theme Scenario Services & Scientific Software[1] supporting energy- and climate-related research in ECE and in the wider academic community. Researchers and research software professionals are developing several open-source tools to facilitate modeling, analysis and visualization of climate change mitigation scenarios. These tools and packages are implemented following best practices of collaborative scientific software development, seeking to foster open science and the implementation of the FAIR principles for data management.

As part of its mission, ECE hosts dozens of interactive scenario web applications and databases (aka Scenario Explorer). These databases form an integral part of the research infrastructure at ECE and in the wider integrated-assessment research community and they are also a key tool for dissemination of scientific insights and results. For an example of our work, visit the AR6 Scenario Explorer[2]: it makes accessible the quantitative scenario data underpinning the report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) on “Mitigation of Climate Change” (2022), the contribution of Working Group 3 to the Sixth Assessment Report (AR6). Another state-of-the-art tool is the Climate Solutions Explorer[3], which presents downscaled scenario data using interactive maps from the Horizon Europe project ENGAGE. Other tools widely used in the research community are the MESSAGEix Integrated Assessment Modeling framework[4] and the Python package pyam for scenario data analysis and visualization[5].

The software stack consists primarily of open-source Python packages for scenario processing and database management as well as three-tier web applications (Web UI, Java servlets, ORACLE/Postgres RDBMS). We use GitHub Actions and Jenkins for CI/CD, and we strive to adopt Agile software development practices in our daily work. IIASA supports continuous learning of its staff, facilitating formal trainings and informal sharing of best practices among research software professionals.

[1] https://software.ece.iiasa.ac.at

[2] https://data.ece.iiasa.ac.at/ar6

[3] https://www.climate-solutions-explorer.eu

[4] https://docs.messageix.org

[5] https://pyam-iamc.readthedocs.io

MAIN TASKS AND RESPONSIBILITIES

• Develop web-based graphical user interfaces for analysis and visualization of integrated-assessment scenarios, including interactive infographics for non-expert audiences and dashboards for selection, diagnostics, and validation of scenario results. These new interfaces and tools will complement existing Python packages, which are aimed at expert users.
• Design web-based interactive data visualization features, in particular maps based on raster and vector data, to work natively within the existing Scenario Explorer infrastructure such that these new visualization tools can be used for dissemination of scenario results to both expert and non-expert audiences.
• Implement data processing workflows to transform research results such that they can easily be served via the web-based tools for data visualization and dissemination of results in close collaboration with the research community.

Beyond the above mentioned tasks, the successful candidate will also work on general activities of the Scenario Services & Scientific Software research theme, including:

• Contribute to ongoing research activities by implementing new features in the scientific software packages in close collaboration with scientific staff.
• Provide support and guidance on best-practice of scientific software development and the use of tools developed in ECE to researchers at IIASA and collaborators in the wider community.
• Documentation of the software stack and all modules at high professional standards.
• In line with the team spirit that prevails at IIASA, the incumbent may occasionally work on other tasks assigned by their superiors, that might not be directly related to this appointment but where the post holder has relevant experience and skills, and/or a shortage of immediate personnel capabilities requires such.

Read the full job announcement