Scientist 3, In Vivo Translational Imaging

About the role

The Opportunity In the Department of Translational Imaging, you will drive preclinical and translational imaging research to help deliver life-changing healthcare solutions.

You will work within a highly collaborative, multidisciplinary environment, moving seamlessly between in vivo experimentation, scanner operations (preclinical MRI/PET), quantitative analysis, and modern AI-enabled computational workflows to translate imaging data into therapeutic discoveries.

Key responsibilities include: Design, execute, and optimize in vivo preclinical imaging studies following approved ethical, compliance, and institutional safety standards. Operate and refine preclinical MRI protocols, applying quantitative methods to characterize anatomy, microstructure, physiology, and therapeutic treatment responses.

Support multimodal imaging studies by integrating data across nuclear imaging (PET/SPECT) and biodistribution workflows. Develop and maintain robust, reproducible image-processing pipelines for registration, segmentation, quantitative feature extraction, and longitudinal analysis.

Build scalable, reproducible analysis code primarily in Python, executing workflows across High-Performance Computing (HPC) clusters utilizing containers and GPU acceleration. Apply AI tools, prompting techniques, and coding agents to accelerate scientific discovery, streamline analysis prototyping, and enhance code documentation.

Partner cross-functionally with biologists, pharmacologists, computational biologists, and research leaders to translate multimodal imaging endpoints into actionable scientific decisions. Who you are You hold an advanced degree (Ph.D. or equivalent combined education and experience) in Biomedical Engineering, Biophysics, Physics, Imaging Science, Computer Science, or a related quantitative discipline.

You bring practical hands-on experience or demonstrated comfort conducting in vivo model procedures within institutionally regulated research environments. You possess strong working knowledge of MRI physics and image formation, including pulse sequences, contrast mechanisms, signal-to-noise optimization, and artifact mitigation.

You have demonstrated expertise analyzing 3D/4D quantitative imaging data using Python (or equivalent scientific programming) within Linux and version-controlled (Git) environments. You have practical fluency leveraging AI-assisted computational tools, LLM prompting, or coding agents to accelerate research and development workflows.

Preferred Hands-on experience with preclinical PET or SPECT acquisition, reconstruction, biodistribution analysis, and quantitative multimodal data integration. Experience developing or optimizing custom MRI pulse sequences, novel reconstruction algorithms, quantitative imaging biomarkers, and/or contrast-agent dynamics.

Solid understanding of computer vision, image processing, and machine learning/deep learning methods for biomedical image segmentation, registration, and automated quality control. Proven experience working on High-Performance Computing (HPC) clusters with workload managers (such as Slurm), containerization technologies (Docker, Apptainer/Singularity), and GPU acceleration.

Proficiency in additional scientific programming languages and platforms (e.g., MATLAB, R, C/C++, ITK, 3D Slicer, or equivalent biomedical toolkits). Background in drug discovery, translational medicine, or oncology/neuroscience biomarker development, with a track record of bridging imaging metrics to pharmacological mechanism of action.

Demonstrable scientific curiosity, agility, and comfort navigating seamlessly between hands-on scanner/bench work and dry-lab computational modeling. Please note this is a lab-based role at our South San Francisco, CA campus. Onsite presence is required. Relocation benefits are available for this job posting.

The expected salary range for this position based on the primary location of South San Francisco, CA is $103,400 to $192,000. Actual pay will be determined based on experience, qualifications, geographic location, and other job-related factors permitted by law. A discretionary annual bonus may be available based on individual and Company performance.

This position also qualifies for the benefits detailed at the link provided below.