Director / Senior Director, Machine Learning for Biology

Required

• Deep knowledge and understanding with common and state of the art AI/ML methods and innovations and large-scale training procedures, applied to biological data modalities (e.g., single-cell, perturbation-response, spatial, or sequence data).
• We are looking for a broad expertise and mastery across various AI/ML domains, specifically: reasoning and open-ended learning framework design for scientific hypothesis generation and evaluation; large-scale pretraining, fine-tuning, and post-training of foundation models, including RL, distillations, finetuning, and strategies to reduce hallucination and align model objectives with scientific discovery; model architectures that span multimodal generative and predictive modeling (normalizing flows, diffusion models, LLMs) for out-of-distribution generalization in biological systems; and hybrid modeling approaches — model identifiability, robustness, and regularized/interpretable methods such as anchor or energy-based models — for biological tasks, including target identification; semantic-based dynamic inference, virtual cell and world model paradigms.
• A strong track record of leading innovative biological ML projects to success, while foreseeing and mitigating ML project failure modes at scale.
• Ability to think strategically, and can optimize for the long term while acting and delivering with pace.
• Ability to contribute to a culture of continuous learning and technical innovation, ensuring a rigorous balance between creative exploration and strategic resource allocation and priorities.
• Stay current with scientific and data science advancements, integrating relevant knowledge into computational biology.
• Intellectually curious with a strong pulse on the computational Landscape, and ability to decipher and prioritize AI trends from hype to maintain a competitive edge.
• Education: PhD in Machine Learning, Computer Science, Computational Biology, Bioinformatics, or a related quantitative field.
• The level will be based on relevant experience and track record of technical and people leadership gained within a biotech or AI driven life sciences environment. Typically:
• Director: PhD + 10+ years experience with a proven track record, with a minimum of 4–5 years of experience, in people management.
• Senior Director: PhD +14+ years experience, with 7–8+ years of people/team leadership, and a demonstrable broad background driving multiple programs through multi disciplinary teams.
• The hiring range for Redwood City, CA: