Lead AI Scientist for Multimodal Drug Discovery

Johnson & Johnson Innovation; Cambridge (MA); On-site; USD 117,000 - 201,000; Full time

Job summary

Johnson & Johnson Innovation is recruiting for the role of Principal Scientist – AI-Reasoning for Drug Discovery, primarily based at Spring House, PA, with other possible locations including Cambridge, MA and New Jersey sites. You will architect an AI-Reasoning platform to support Translational Safety decision making in drug discovery and development.

Lead multimodal AI research, mentor teams, validate AI agents against experts, and publish findings in premier venues while advancing reliability

Qualifications

• Ph.D. in AI/ML or related fields (computer science, machine learning, data science, applied mathematics, statistics) with 2+ years of proven experience.
• Deep expertise in Bayesian inference, uncertainty quantification, information theory, causal inference, graph neural networks, and related methodologies that advance agentic reasoning.
• Proficiency with agentic frameworks (LangGraph, DSPy, mem0) and deep learning platforms (PyTorch, TensorFlow), and extend these tools for novel scientific applications.
• Exceptional Python programming skills, capable of architecting scalable solutions that bridge innovation and production deployment.
• Ability to lead small teams of researchers to achieve success in their work.
• Understanding of drug discovery pipeline and familiarity with biological data types
• Strong understanding of statistics and applicable methods to validate model performance
• Familiarity with cloud hosting solutions (ex. AWS and/or Azure)

Responsibilities

• Pioneer breakthrough multimodal AI systems that synthesize scientific data into actionable scientific insights which accelerate drug discovery
• Architect next-generation agent memory systems that establish how AI retains knowledge and makes context-aware decisions, creating persistent intelligence that evolves across the entire discovery-to-development pipeline
• Define the future of AI reliability in R&D by orchestrating groundbreaking research in uncertainty quantification and establishing new standards for trustworthy AI-driven scientific reasoning
• Shape the scientific vision as an inspiring leader, translating emerging AI/ML frontiers into transformative applications while mentoring teams to push the boundaries of what's possible in computational drug discovery
• Drive scientific validation and impact by rigorously benchmarking AI agents against top human experts and state-of-the-art methods, with the opportunity to publish paradigm-shifting findings in premier venues.

Skills

AI/ML Expertise

Uncertainty Quantification

Bayesian Inference

Python

Deep Learning

Agentic Reasoning

Multimodal Data

Leadership

Research & Publication

Data Analysis

Cloud Computing

Scientific Communication

Education

Ph.D. in AI/ML or related fields

Job description

Johnson & Johnson Innovation is recruiting for the role of Principal Scientist – AI-Reasoning for Drug Discovery, primarily based at Spring House, PA, with other possible locations including Cambridge, MA and New Jersey sites. You will architect an AI-Reasoning platform to support Translational Safety decision making in drug discovery and development.

Lead multimodal AI research, mentor teams, validate AI agents against experts, and publish findings in premier venues while advancing reliability