Senior Scientist, Data Science (PDMB) Full-time

AI/ML Expert

Are you passionate about applying cutting-edge AI/ML to transform drug discovery? The Pharmacokinetics, Dynamics, Metabolism, and Bioanalytics (PDMB) department of our company Research Laboratories is seeking an AI/ML expert to help reimagine how PDMB assesses and optimizes drug candidates. You will join a dynamic Data Science team accelerating discovery through advanced analytics, predictive modeling, and decision-support tools.

In this role, you will invent, build, and deploy novel AI/ML approaches to identify and optimize drug candidates with balanced efficacy, safety, and developability profiles. You'll collaborate closely with principal investigators and lab-based scientists to refine experimental designs, generate testable hypotheses, and deliver intuitive visualizations and models at the intersection of translational PK/PD, ADME, bioanalytics, and data science.

In this role, you will:

• Develop and deploy AI/ML models (e.g., active learning, Bayesian optimization, multi-objective optimization) to improve decision-making in preclinical and early development.
• Build robust data pipelines to capture, integrate, curate, and visualize multimodal data (in vitro, in vivo, in silico; PK/PD, ADME, omics, imaging) to enable reproducible analysis at scale.
• Partner with IT data engineers/architects to design scalable, secure data and model infrastructure (data lakes, feature stores, MLOps) aligned with PDMB scientific needs.
• Inform project strategy by guiding experimental design, assay selection, and candidate optimization; communicate model insights, uncertainty, and trade-offs to cross-functional teams.
• Translate complex analytics into actionable recommendations and easy-to-use tools/dashboards for scientists and project leaders.
• Stay current on emerging methods (e.g., foundation models, generative design, causal inference) and evaluate their applicability to PDMB problems.

Note: This position is available in SSF, CA; Boston/Cambridge, MA; Rahway, NJ or West Point, PA based on candidate preference.

Qualifications:

Education:

• Ph.D. (or Ph.D. candidate with expected graduation date by March 31, 2026) in Computer Science, Statistics, Applied Mathematics, Bioinformatics, Computational Biology, Computational Chemistry, Chemical Informatics, Engineering or related fields with relevant experience.

Required Experience and Skills:

• Proven track record of research with first-coauthor publications at top-notch peer-reviewed journals or conferences
• Strong foundation in statistics and machine learning, including model development, validation, and performance/uncertainty assessment.
• Experience working with high-dimensional, heterogeneous datasets; grounding in data quality, curation, and feature engineering.
• Ability to communicate complex analyses clearly to non-experts and to collaborate effectively in interdisciplinary teams.

Preferred Experience and Skills:

• Domain knowledge in chemistry, molecular biology, and/or biochemistry; familiarity with PK/PD and ADME concepts.
• Experience with deep learning or generative models for molecular design, QSAR, property prediction, or LLM on scientific text.
• Experience with cloud platforms and data/ML services (AWS/Azure/GCP), containers (Docker), workflow orchestration (Airflow, Prefect), and MLOps (MLflow, SageMaker).
• Ability to influence and enable scientific teams to adopt data-driven methods and positive change.

The salary range for this role is $156,500.00 – $246,300.00. This is the lowest to highest salary we in good faith believe we would pay for this role at the time of this posting. An employee's position within the salary range will be based on several factors including, but not limited to relevant education, qualifications, certifications, experience, skills, geographic location, government requirements, and business or organizational needs.

The successful candidate will be eligible for annual bonus and long-term incentive, if applicable.

We offer a comprehensive package of benefits. Available benefits include medical, dental, vision healthcare and other insurance benefits (for employee and family), retirement benefits, including 401(k), paid holidays, vacation, and compassionate and sick days. More information about benefits is available at https://jobs.merck.com/us/en/compensation-and-benefits.