AI Biologist - Microscopy
spectraforce technologiesMillbrae, CA
AI Biologist - Microscopy
spectraforce technologiesMillbrae, CASenior L5
Molecular and Cellular BiologistsBiological Scientists, All OtherMedical Scientists, Except Epidemiologists
Research and Development in BiotechnologyResearch and Development in the Physical, Engineering, and Life SciencesMedical Laboratories
APPLY NOW (opens in a new tab)Position Title: AI Biologist - Microscopy
Work Location: San Francisco or Remote
Assignment Duration: FTE role
Work Arrangement: San Francisco or Remote
Position Summary:
- Our organization builds rigorous scientific benchmarks (benchmarks.bio) for AI agents across biology. We work with frontier labs and pharma to measure whether agents can handle real biological workflows: the messy, multi-layer reasoning that matters in the field.
- Background & Context:
- We're seeking an AI Biologist to join our Microscopy team, pushing what AI can achieve in biological imaging.
Key Responsibilities:
- Define what expert reasoning looks like for an imaging question, and write gold-standard answers with the rationale an experienced microscopist or pathologist would defend
- Design realistic scenarios across the imaging workflow: sample prep, staining, acquisition, preprocessing, segmentation, quantification, and interpretation
- Curate image datasets across modalities: immunofluorescence, confocal and live-cell, electron microscopy, histology and histopathology, and high-content screening
- Build analysis pipelines in Python, including deep-learning segmentation, that produce verifiable ground truth
- Partner with software engineers to turn your judgment into new workflows
- Test whether agents distinguish true signal from artifact, such as bleed-through, uneven illumination, fixation damage, out-of-focus planes, or segmentation failure
- Adjudicate ambiguous images: decide what the data supports, where reasonable experts would disagree, and which additional stain, image, or experiment would settle the call
- Test whether agents choose the right imaging modality, resolution, and unit of analysis for the question
- Interrogate agent reasoning step by step, and challenge conclusions that sound right but would not survive pathologist review or lab meeting
- Pinpoint where agents go wrong: why a step fails, what an expert would do instead, and what evidence would change the call
- Score agent confidence, rewarding explicit uncertainty over overconfident calls on ambiguous images
- Qualification & Experience: PhD in cell biology, bioimage analysis, pathology, or a related field; or an MD with pathology training
- Senior, hands-on imaging experience: you have looked at thousands of samples and know what normal and abnormal look like
- Direct experience with image segmentation tools such as Cell
- Profiler, Cellpose, StarDist, QuPath, ilastik, napari, or FijiDeep expertise in at least one area (bioimage analysis, cell biology, or histopathology) and working fluency across the others
- Strong command of experimental design, image quantification, and statisticsAI-ready from day one: daily use of Claude, Cursor, or similar agents, with the judgment to spot where model reasoning is technically correct but scientifically unsound
- Confidence to overrule an AI agent when the evidence demands it, and the openness to update when shown wrong
- Ability to calibrate confidence and communicate uncertainty rather than defaulting to binary calls
Bonus:
electron microscopy, pathology, or pharmacology experience (e.g., pharmacodynamic or drug-uptake imaging assays)
Bonus:
familiarity with public resources such as the Image Data Resource (IDR), BioImage Archive, Human Protein Atlas, Cell Painting Gallery, or TCGA whole-slide images Applicant Notices & Disclaimers For information on benefits, equal opportunity employment, and location-specific applicant notices, click here
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Level
Senior L5
Location
Millbrae, CA
Occupation
Molecular and Cellular Biologists
Industry
Research and Development in Biotechnology
Posted
2 days ago