Software Engineer, Lab Platform

Arc Institute•Palo Alto, CA

11d•Hybrid

About The Position

You'll join Arc's Infrastructure Engineering team and own support and operations for our laboratory information management system (LIMS). Arc's scientists record their samples and experiments there, including the variables they change from one experiment to the next. That record is business intelligence for the lab: it's how scientists learn which conditions improve an assay, and it also feeds the pipelines that process lab data automatically. You'll run the request queue, make schema changes, train users and maintain the checks on data as it's entered, and you'll turn the requests that keep coming back into automation. You don't need LIMS experience: strong Python and SQL and an interest in lab data matter more, and we'll teach you the platform. You'll start under our lab platform Tech Lead, who will review your work and mentor you.

Requirements

Bachelor’s degree with 0-2 years of relevant experience, or an advanced degree.
You write solid Python and SQL, and you're comfortable working with REST APIs.
You debug problems in systems you didn't build, working from the code, logs and data.
You use AI coding tools day to day or are ready to learn, you check what they produce, and you're careful with sensitive research data.
You explain technical things clearly to scientists, and you write docs and training that people use.
You ask for help early and take feedback well.
You've owned a piece of work from start to finish, in school, an internship or a job, and you stayed responsible for it after it shipped.
Work onsite in our Palo Alto office at least 3 days a week.

Nice To Haves

You've used a LIMS or ELN, such as Benchling, or you've worked with lab data like samples and sequencing metadata.
You've automated a repeated manual task with scripts, bots or agents.
You've worked on CI pipelines, tests or repo templates.
You've supported the users of a tool, on a help desk, as a TA or on an on-call rotation.

Responsibilities

Run the request queue for Arc's lab data systems, from questions and fixes to schema changes, which you'll ship through our change workflow so other teams' pipelines don't break.
Support the templates scientists record experiments with, and the command-line tools that pull their data for analysis.
Run training sessions for scientists, and write the docs they come back to.
Build and maintain the checks that catch errors in data as scientists enter it, so bad records don't reach analysis or pipelines.
Help carry out the refactor of the team and permission structure in our LIMS, which decides who can see and edit what.
Turn the requests that keep coming back into automation, and choose the approach that fits the problem: a script, a scheduled job, a template change or an AI agent.
Write the runbook, add the checks and retire the manual step; changes go through the team's code review.