Characterizing biological foundation models

Inceptive•Palo Alto, CA

15h•Onsite

About The Position

At Inceptive, you will help pioneer the next generation of AI-designed drugs, with the potential to positively impact billions of people, as part of a collaborative, antedisciplinary team. We advance the state of the art in molecular design by training large-scale foundation models that enable cutting-edge generative approaches. Those models learn from diverse biological datasets and are refined through focused experimentation, large-scale training, and feedback from lab measurements. Progress depends not only on building better models, but also on understanding what they learn, where they fail, how data shapes their behavior, and how to evaluate them against biologically meaningful objectives. You will collaborate closely with AI researchers and biologists to rigorously characterize the behavior, capabilities, and limitations of biological foundation models and their applications. You will identify valuable datasets, develop meaningful evaluations, investigate model behavior, and generate insights that guide model development, data strategy, and experimental priorities across the company.

Requirements

PhD in computational biology, statistics, physics, machine learning, or a related quantitative discipline, or equivalent practical experience, with record of publications or open source tooling in these fields
Strong quantitative reasoning and statistical intuition
Demonstrated ability to identify important scientific questions, design rigorous investigations, and draw reliable conclusions from complex biological data.
Experience analyzing high throughput sequencing data (e.g. RNA-seq, functional genomics / transcriptomics, MPRA), with a focus on robust statistical analysis
Experience collaborating closely with AI/machine learning researchers or applying machine learning or generative AI tools to scientific problems
Familiarity with current AI/machine learning methods, including generative foundation models, representation learning, and model evaluation
Familiarity with publicly available biological datasets and data derived from high throughput assays
Capable programmer in Python and common scientific computing libraries
Excellent written and verbal communication skills, including the ability to explain complex findings to audiences with diverse technical backgrounds
Availability to work with team members across US and Europe, with meetings starting at 8am PT and ending at 7pm CET
Readiness to travel several times a year for company retreats and business events

Nice To Haves

3+ years of post-PhD experience in computational biology, biostatistics, machine learning research, or a related field

Responsibilities

Embody our vision of an antedisciplinary environment and embrace learning about areas outside of your traditional area of expertise
Investigate how model performance changes with data quantity, data quality, dataset composition, and training methodology
Develop biologically meaningful evaluations and benchmarks that measure progress toward therapeutic design objectives
Design and execute rigorous experiments to understand the behavior, capabilities, and limitations of biological foundation models
Identify sources of potential artifacts, bias, and noise in biological datasets
Identify promising biological datasets for model training and evaluation, and develop computational pipelines for preprocessing, quality control, and exploratory analysis.
Design studies, in silico or in the lab, that reveal what models have learned and which biological signals drive model behavior
Work with biologists to formulate hypotheses and translate biological questions into measurable machine learning experiments
Partner with AI researchers and engineers to prioritize research directions, data collection efforts, and model improvements
Analyze, visualize, and communicate experimental findings to inform decisions across teams

Benefits

A competitive compensation package
30 days paid vacation per year
Comprehensive health insurance for US based Beginners
401K with company match for US based Beginners
Direktversicherung for German Beginners
Quarterly company-wide retreats
Monthly wellness benefit
Budget for multiple visits per year to our offices in Berlin, Palo Alto or Switzerland
Learning & Development budget to attend conferences, take courses, or otherwise invest in your professional growth, as well as access to the Learning & Development platform EdX and Hone
A buddy to help you get settled