Job Description

Posting Text
The AI Research, Department of Computer Science at the University of South Dakota (USD) is seeking Computational Scientists in Biomedical and Clinical AI Research (Biomedical AI Scientists) to support ongoing projects within the South Dakota Biomedical Computation Collaborative (SDBCC), a federally funded program. The research of this position will focus on foundational machine learning models on large-scale biomedical and clinical datasets, including single- and multi-omics (genomics, transcriptomics, proteomics, etc.), medical imaging, and electronic health records, with a strong commitment to AI Standards and Innovation. The role involves working on the advancement of AI and machine learning, in line with USD’s mission as the flagship university of the state, and home to South Dakota’s leading programs in AI.

SDBCC is uniquely positioned as a vibrant, multidisciplinary collaborative of computing scientists, biomedical researchers, clinicians, and engineers, drawing its strength from its core institutional partners: the University of South Dakota (USD), the Sanford School of Medicine, and the South Dakota School of Mines & Technology (SDSMT).

This position offers an excellent opportunity to advance translational biomedical research and clinical investigation through the development of intelligent systems for diagnostics, therapeutics, prognosis, and drug discovery. The appointee will entertain numerous opportunities to work with teams of basic and translational biomedical scientists as well as clinicians and specialists of various medical fields and to contribute to the formulation and application of innovative research plans.

Key Responsibilities:
Develop, implement, and optimize scalable high-end machine learning models for biomedical and clinical research problems, including multimodal and context-aware systems and AI agent-based solutions.
Collaborate with domain experts to define problem statements and deploy ML solutions across diverse datasets.
Contribute to publications, proposals, and collaborative research efforts across SDBCC member institutions.
Freedom to conceptualize new research projects/directions within the SDBCC mission.
Support reproducible research by maintaining well-documented code, datasets, and workflows.

Required Qualifications:
MS in Computer Science, Data Science, Artificial Intelligence, Biomedical Engineering, or a closely related field.
Proficiency in Python and common ML libraries (e.g., scikit-learn, PyTorch, TensorFlow, JAX).
Experience with data preprocessing, model evaluation, and performance tuning.
Strong analytical thinking, collaborative skills, interdisciplinary collaboration, and written/verbal communication abilities.

Preferred Qualifications:
A PhD in Computer Science, Data Science, Artificial Intelligence, Biomedical Engineering, or a closely related field.
Experience with biomedical and/or clinical applications such as medical imaging informatics, clinical data, or molecular and omics data (e.g., RNA-seq, single-cell profiling, proteomics).
Familiarity with high-performance computing (HPC) or cloud-based platforms.
Knowledge of explainable AI (XAI), federated learning, or trustworthy AI in healthcare contexts.
Experience with collaborative grant-funded research and manuscript preparation.
Proven track record of research excellence, as evidenced by publications in top-tier conferences and journals.
Experience or success with research grant application.

Interested applicants must submit a cover letter (not exceeding two pages), resume, research statement (1 page), two publication sample copies (top-tier articles), and contact information for three professional references. All application materials should be submitted through the University of South Dakota’s online employment portal at www.yourfuture.sdbor.edu.
Review of applications will begin immediately and will continue until the position is filled. Hiring is immediate and applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis until the position is filled.

This is a grant-funded, three-year position, with the potential for extension based on performance and continued funding. To learn more about the lab’s research, please visit www.ai-research-lab.org. For more information, please contact Dr. KC Santosh, Professor and Chair of Computer Science, Founding Director of the AI Research Lab, and Principal Investigator for AI at SD-BCC, at [email protected].