Senior Bioinformatics Scientist, Biomarker Discovery

---

Job description

About Karius

Karius is a venture-backed life science startup focused on transforming the way infectious diseases are diagnosed. Combining Next-Generation Sequencing and proprietary data analysis, we can identify over 1,000 pathogens from a single blood sample with typical turnaround time in one business day. By unlocking the information present in microbial cell-free DNA, we're helping doctors quickly solve their most challenging cases, with a future vision of accelerating clinical trials, discovering new microbes, and reducing patient suffering worldwide.

Why Should You Join Us?

Karius core mission is to conquer infectious diseases through innovations around genomic sequencing and machine learning. The company's platform is already delivering unprecedented insight into the microbial landscape, providing clinicians with a comprehensive test capable of identifying more than a thousand pathogens directly from blood. Through this journey, we realized that the microbial cell-free DNA platform may hold value that goes well beyond the direct diagnosis of infections. You, as part of the Karius team, will be able to see the immense opportunity to expand the human knowledge around this emerging topic and apply it directly to critical problems in human health and disease.

Position Summary

You are highly curious and creative and desire to continuously grow and improve in your goal to make an impact on patients. You will be a key member of the Computational Biomarker Discovery team focusing on the deep exploration and analysis of the biological interplay between various conditions and molecular data. You will deliver preliminary biological signatures to inform translational science and precision medicine outside of the traditional infectious disease arena. You will conduct thoughtful computational analyses by determining the analysis plan and executing based on understanding the biological rationale and the available data to make insightful connections. You have a passion for exploring new applications of technology, generating hypotheses, and revealing hidden secrets in data.

Reports to: Director, Computational Biomarker Discovery.

Location: Redwood City, CA

Primary Responsibilities

• Individual contributor to Computational Biomarker Discovery, focusing on the deep exploration and analysis of the biological interplay between various conditions and molecular data.

• Delivery of preliminary biological signatures to inform translational science and precision medicine outside of the traditional infectious disease arena.

• Participate in experimental design, conduct computational analyses, understand biological rationale, set the analysis plan, and execute using the necessary tools and methodologies to make insightful connections.

• Share a passion for exploring new applications of Karius technology.

• Work closely with the scientific, medical, engineering, and commercial teams, to set our company's goals and partner in the development of our next partnerships and products.

• Continue to grow and learn in the necessary biological/scientific domains and technological aspects of the field through internal knowledge acquisition but also staying current with the latest relevant literature.

What's Fun About the Job?

Karius is operating at the edge of what is now known to be possible in infectious disease diagnostics. With that, comes a wave of new and incredible challenges and opportunities. To deliver on that value, you will be tapping into some of the most advanced technologies, architecting and innovating where the current solutions simply don't suffice. You will get to see how much your work really matters.

Travel: No travel required.

Physical Requirements

Subject to extended periods of sitting and/or standing, vision to monitor, and moderate noise levels. Work is performed in an office environment.

Position Requirements

• Ph.D. in computer science, statistics, mathematics, physics, genetics, or related fields, preferably with a focus on computational biology.

• 4+ years of biotech, pharma, or relevant experience, or equivalent; title will be commensurate with experience.

• Publications leveraging innovative mathematical models used in the investigation and interpretation of biological and biomarker data.

• Experience with, and understanding of, modern statistics and machine learning.

• Emphasis on controlling false discoveries and identifying causal mechanisms.

• Proficiency in working with high dimensional, large-scale datasets with low signal-to-noise.

• Excellence at communication and collaboration within a cross-functional team

• Self-starting mentality and ability to drive results.

• Post-doc experience in statistics, computational biology, genetics, or biological field with a strong computational aspect.

• Relevant publications.

• Innovation surrounding connecting biological insights and complex mechanisms of microbiome host-environment interactions.

• Familiarity and experience with bioinformatics tools, approaches, and workflows, particularly those related to next-generation sequencing data analysis.

• Familiarity with a range of exploratory study and clinical trial designs and analyses, especially in pharmaceutical applications.

Personal Qualifications

• Passionate, purpose-driven, and excited about Karius' mission.

• Excellence at communication and collaboration within a cross-functional team.

• Detail oriented with exceptional organizational and time management skills.

• Self-starting mentality and ability to drive results.

• Comfortable working in an environment which combines both research aspects as well as development.

• Ability to work effectively and efficiently in a fast-paced (startup) environment.

At Karius, we value a diverse and inclusive workplace and provide equal employment opportunity for all applicants and employees, and are committed to honor and invest in the full diversity of people, in our hiring, recruiting, and development of employees across the Company. All qualified applicants for employment are encouraged to apply and will be considered without regard to an individual's race, color, sex, gender identity, and gender expression (including transgender individuals who are transitioning, have transitioned, or are perceived to be transitioning to the gender with which they identify), religion, age, national origin or ancestry, citizenship, physical or mental disability, medical condition, family care status, marital status, domestic partner status, sexual orientation, genetic information, military or veteran status, or any other basis protected by federal, state or local laws. If you are unable to submit your application due to a disability, please contact us at and we will accommodate qualified individuals with disabilities.