Overview
Prof. Marinka Zitnik invites applications for a Postdoctoral Research Fellowship position at Harvard University.
The selected candidates will lead cutting-edge research in therapeutic AI, focusing on target discovery, design and prediction of complex perturbations, virtual molecular simulators, biomarker discovery, treatment response prediction, molecular design and optimization, biomolecular interaction modeling, clinical drug development, and drug repurposing. Research efforts will also include patient selection for therapeutic development and treatment matching and the study of drug effects across multi-scale molecular and cellular contexts.
This work will develop and leverage advanced methods in geometric deep learning, large-scale knowledge graphs, and biomedical foundation models to tackle key challenges in drug design and precision therapy.
Interested candidates are encouraged to explore our recent publications and research directions before submitting their applications.
Qualifications
We are seeking highly motivated applicants with expertise in one or more of the following areas: agentic AI, geometric deep learning, large-scale knowledge graphs, biomedical foundation models, multimodal learning, and generative AI. Strong technical skills and prior experience in therapeutic science, drug design, or clinical drug development are essential. If you have both a track record in AI research and wet lab experience, that is fantastic.
Ideal candidates will have demonstrably strong research skills, evidenced by multiple publications in top-tier machine learning or artificial intelligence conferences and/or leading scientific journals.
Candidates must hold a Ph.D. or equivalent degree in machine learning, computer science or a closely related field.
Excellent programming skills and practical experience with leading machine learning frameworks are required. Applicants must have experience applying AI to biology and medicine. Familiarity with modern AI environments, including multi-GPU model training and large-scale inference on dozens to hundreds of GPUs, is a plus.
Application process
The position is available immediately and can be renewed annually. Interested applicants should submit the following documents via email to Prof. Zitnik and use the subject line “Postdoctoral Research Fellows in AI for Therapeutics”:
- Curriculum Vitae (include links to your academic webpage and GitHub repositories for methods you developed)
- Three representative publications (preprints are acceptable)
- Statement of research (two pages) describing prior research experience and future research plan
- Contacts for three letters of recommendation (the letters will be solicited after the initial review)
We are currently reviewing applications. Interested candidates are encouraged to submit their applications early.
Advisor
Marinka Zitnik is an Associate Professor of Biomedical Informatics at Harvard Medical School, Associate Faculty at Kempner Institute for the Study of Natural and Artificial Intelligence at Harvard University, and Associate Member at Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard. Zitnik investigates foundations of AI that contribute to the scientific understanding of medicine and therapeutic design, eventually enabling AI to learn and innovate on its own. Her research won best paper and research awards, including the Overton Prize, Kavli Fellowship of the National Academy of Sciences, Kaneb Fellowship award at Harvard Medical School, NSF CAREER Award, awards from the International Society for Computational Biology, International Conference in Machine Learning, Bayer Early Excellence in Science, Amazon Faculty Research, Google Faculty Research, Roche Alliance with Distinguished Scientists, and two Sanofi iDEA-iTECH Awards.