Senior Data Scientist - Clinical AI development

About the Department

Our Research & Development organization brings together the best minds in life science innovation. The teams located in facilities in Lexington, Watertown, Cambridge and Plainsboro reflect the full R&D continuum, from early research through late-stage clinical development. Here, we are building for the future, creating a distinct R&D community based on collaboration, partnerships, and cutting-edge research across multiple modalities and therapeutic areas. We recognize that improving human health starts here and that patients rely on us. Our R&D hub merges biotech speed and agility with large pharmaceutical company quality, resources, and stability, uniting the best of both worlds to develop new medicines for patients.

The Position

The Senior Data Scientist II will contribute to the research team's effort towards exploring and creating new technology and being a world leader in data science within our fields. The Senior Data Scientist II will bring elements of data collection, preparation, and engineering as well as software engineering in a data science context. The Senior Data Scientist II will develop and validate algorithms and models in support of data science efforts with a high degree of initiative and self-sufficiency.  Moreover, the Senior Data Scientist II will guide more junior Data Scientists in the execution of their tasks, as well as supports them in networking in a complex global organization. 

Open to hiring at the Lead level commensurate with experience

Relationships

The Senior Data Scientist II reports to the Associate Director of the Clinical AI development area. Internal partners include fellow Data Scientists, AI Engineers, and System Architects who serve as primary day-to-day collaborators in the design and delivery of AI/ML solutions. The role also works closely with medical professionals, clinical trial squad members, and biostatisticians to ensure that solutions are grounded in clinical context and meets the needs of drug development workflows 

Essential Functions

• Scientific work:
  • Develop and validate LLM-based solutions for content retrieval, generation, summarization and inference applied to healthcare and drug development challenges
  • Enable & assist in software engineering for AI products: architect services, design APIs, build backend systems, and integrate with frontend applications while meeting performance, safety, privacy & ethics requirements.  
  • Build and maintain requisite data solutions , including vector databases, embedding pipelines, and knowledge bases to support retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) and document understanding
  • Collaborate with other data scientists to design, code, train, test, deploy, and iterate on machine learning systems
  • Explore model-driven reasoning through the application of prompt engineering, model fine-tuning techniques (supervised, LoRA,PEFT, etc.), and optimization methods (quantization, distillation, caching) as part of day-to-day development work.
  • Create technical documentation, runbooks, and training materials for model usage and maintenance.
  • Accomplishes objectives with a high degree of self sufficiency
  • Collaborate with other Data Scientists, as well as engineers from other disciplines to complete daily tasks
  • Actively participates in cross-functional teams to develop AI and ML solutions
  • Stay current on GenAI/LLM research, best practices and technology roadmap  
  • Achieves business goals, shares learnings, knowledge and skills and promotes cross-functional teamwork.
  • Raise the level of competency in the team by seeking and sharing domain knowledge in the area of Data Science, as well as Novo Nordisk’s therapy areas

Physical Requirements

UP to 10% overnight travel required.

Qualifications

• Master’s degree or PhD highly preferred. Minimum of Bachelor’s degree required. Degree within subject matter expertise preferred
• Master’s Degree with 4+ years’ relevant experience, or PhD with 2+ years’ relevant experience, or a Bachelor’s degree with 6+ years’ relevant experience can be considered
• Relevant experience includes:
  • Experience working in LLM and generative AI domain: model selection, system design, fine-tuning (supervised, LoRA, PEFT, etc.), prompt engineering, evaluation, observation, etc. 
  • A foundational understanding of deep/reinforcement learning models and architectures such as transformers, GANs, VAEs, etc.
  • Experience in designing agentic solutions to tackle problems in healthcare, with considerations on evaluation and harnessing.
  • Proven programming skills in Python and familiarity with data science and ML tooling (e.g., Jupyter Notebook, HuggingFace, PyTorch)
  • Experience building data pipelines and retrieval systems (vector databases,embedding pipelines, knowledge bases) to support RAG, Graphs, and document understanding workflows
• Preferred experience includes:
  • PhD with 2+ years’ relevant experience in pharmaceutical industry, healthcare industry, regulated medical device development or in another regulated field.
  • Experience in deploying agentic solutions to tackle problems in healthcare.
  • Familiarity with CI/CD best practices, cloud-based distributed systems, containerization, and test automation, particularly in stateful LLM system designs
  • Ability to execute own Data Science tasks while mentoring more junior Data Scientists in the development of their skills.
  • Proven pulbication record in leading scientific journals
  • Ability to develop and implement sound technical solutions to complex problems.
  • Ability to work independently and in teams, and to collaborate with external parties.

The base compensation range for this position is $100,600 to $155,400. Base compensation is determined based on a number of factors. This position is also eligible for a company bonus based on individual and company performance. Novo Nordisk offers long-term incentive compensation and or company vehicles depending on the position's level or other company factors.

Employees are also eligible to participate in Company employee benefit programs including medical, dental and vision coverage; life insurance; disability insurance; 401(k) savings plan; flexible spending accounts; employee assistance program; tuition reimbursement program; and voluntary benefits such as group legal, critical illness, identity theft protection, pet insurance and auto/home insurance. The Company also offers time off pursuant to its sick time policy, flex-able vacation policy, and parental leave policy.

We commit to an inclusive recruitment process and equality of opportunity for all our job applicants.

At Novo Nordisk, we're not chasing quick fixes – we're creating lasting change for long-term health. For over 100 years, we've been driven by a single purpose: to defeat serious chronic diseases and help millions of people live healthier lives. This dedication fuels our constant curiosity and inspires us to push the boundaries of what's possible in healthcare. We embrace diverse perspectives, seek out bold ideas, and build partnerships rooted in shared purpose. Together, we're making healthcare more accessible, treating and defeating diseases, and pioneering solutions that create change spanning generations. When you join us, you become part of something bigger – a legacy of impact that reaches far beyond today.

Novo Nordisk is an equal opportunity employer. Qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, ethnicity, color, religion, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, national origin, disability, protected veteran status or any other characteristic protected by local, state or federal laws, rules or regulations.

If you are interested in applying to Novo Nordisk and need special assistance or an accommodation to apply, please call us at 1-855-411-5290. This contact is for accommodation requests only and cannot be used to inquire about the status of applications.