Senior AI/ML Lead Scientist — Mission-Centric Data

Aptima; Woburn (MA); On-site; USD 120,000 - 190,000; Full time

Job summary

Aptima in Massachusetts seeks a Senior Data Scientist to lead data-driven problem solving for DoW customers, translating mission needs into AI system requirements and architecture.

You will design ML/AI models, implement evaluation plans, and coordinate a team of AI engineers and researchers across programs. Travel to support customer engagements and multi-site collaboration is expected. Strong communication with behavioral scientists and government stakeholders is essential.

Qualifications

• MS or PhD in data science, computer science, applied mathematics, physics, or related STEM field.
• Demonstrated expertise in the AI/ML applications, spanning stakeholder engagement, requirements scoping, and development of technical solutions.
• Strong quantitative modeling and statistical analysis background, including experimental design.
• Hands-on experience with AI agent development and evaluation, including agentic workflow design, tool integration, and output benchmarking using LangChain and LangGraph.
• Proficiency in Python for data analysis, modeling, simulation, visualization, and development of reproducible analytic workflows.
• Proficiency in SQL for data querying, transformation, and pipeline development across relational and cloud-based data platforms.
• Experience developing custom metrics, indices, and analytic pipelines to operationalize complex behavioral, organizational, or team constructs using real-world, imperfect data.
• Experience designing and executing human-subject experiments and analyzing performance data.
• Experience leading technical tasks or serving as technical lead or PI on government-funded programs.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills, including proposal and customer-facing technical work.
• Proven ability to translate quantitative results into clear, actionable insights for technical teams, behavioral scientists, and non-technical stakeholders, serving as a bridge between disciplines.
• Ability to manage and coordinate multidisciplinary technical teams and travel as needed.

Responsibilities

• Lead the design of ML/AI models, interaction workflows, and recommendation system’s designed for skill selection or staff profiles.
• Understand the science that can inform requirements addressing trust, explainability, complexity, and characteristics of modern ML solutions.
• Serve as technical lead or task lead on AI and human–AI system development efforts, coordinating work across AI engineers and researchers.
• Translate mission needs and human performance objectives into system requirements, technical architectures, and evaluation plans. Review and guide system implementations to ensure usability, explainability, and operational suitability.
• Design and execute experiments and statistical studies to evaluate traditional AI/ML, as well as generative AI and agentic systems.
• Design, develop, and oversee analytic pipelines and performance metrics to operationalize complex behavioral and organizational constructs using real-world data.
• Translate quantitative results into clear, actionable insights for technical teams, behavioral scientists, and government stakeholders, bridging theory, data, and system implementation.
• Lead technical contributions to proposals, system designs, and customer deliverables. Present technical work internally and at relevant external forums to include conferences, customer briefings, and other venues.
• Mentor junior staff and promote best practices in human-centered AI system development. Contribute to internal initiatives for AI system development and evaluation.

Skills

Python programming

SQL querying

Data analysis

Education

MS or PhD in data science, computer science, applied mathematics, physics, or related STEM field

Tools

LangChain

LangGraph

Pandas

NumPy

Matplotlib/Plotly

Job description

Aptima in Massachusetts seeks a Senior Data Scientist to lead data-driven problem solving for DoW customers, translating mission needs into AI system requirements and architecture.

You will design ML/AI models, implement evaluation plans, and coordinate a team of AI engineers and researchers across programs. Travel to support customer engagements and multi-site collaboration is expected. Strong communication with behavioral scientists and government stakeholders is essential.