A few years ago, I was talking with the director for bioinformatics and such at a reasonably large medical research university. He told me they really don't hi

A few years ago, I was talking with the director for bioinformatics and such at a reasonably large medical research university. He told me they really don't hire "pure" computer science people any more, because there are increasingly academic programs combining CS with biology, and they much prefer to hire people who are skilled in both arenas. That said, I agree with you; it ought to be possible for a good programmer to get into the field and be useful. But gaining more experience/knowledge about the biology side of things may be an important ingredient.