Staff Data Scientist
Xilis
Data Science
Utrecht, Netherlands
Posted on Thursday, August 8, 2024
Xilis is an innovation-driven biotech company developing its proprietary MicroOrganoSphere (“MOS”) Technology for functional precision oncology. Xilis’ MOS Technology enables rapid and scalable generation of patient tumor models that retain patient-specific tumor biology and tumor microenvironment, representing one of the most translationally relevant ex vivo technologies for precision oncology drug discovery and development. The headquarters, Xilis, Inc., is located in Research Triangle Park, Durham, NC, and the subsidiary Xilis B.V. is located in Utrecht, the Netherlands. Xilis is building a functional precision medicine platform that incorporates scaled multi-modal profiling of therapeutic activity and AI/ML-enabled analytics to catalyze functional precision medicine drug discovery, development, and diagnostics. Collectively, Xilis aims to harness its MOS Platform to enable the development of the most effective therapeutics and guide them to the right patients at the right time.
Role
The Data Science team supports all data, machine learning, bioinformatics, statistical and analytical approaches across Xilis (both in the Netherlands and the USA). In this role, you will lead data analysis projects in support of our novel 3D organoid-based assays and products at the forefront of precision cancer therapeutics.
You will help define, build, and scale up Xilis’ patient-derived 3D model platform toward drug development and immuno-oncology applications. This role will be embedded within the scientific team at Xilis BV, based in Utrecht, the Netherlands. As a founding member of the Netherlands data science team, you will be coordinating and working closely with the onsite laboratory staff as well as our existing international data science experts, and will exert experimental design influences on the data you will be analyzing. As such the ideal candidate will have experience with driving data analytics independently, and also experience with cross-functional collaborations. You will tackle some of the most interesting biological and technical questions related to functional precision cancer therapeutics. You will drive characterization of 3D biological systems using diverse technologies including flow cytometry, -omics or brightfield/confocal microscopy experiments. You will lead the design and implementation of pipelines and artificial intelligence algorithms that combine and harness multiple sources of data in order to extract biological and clinical insights. You will work closely with experimental scientists, device engineers, R&D, business development, software and operations teams to deliver solutions to further precision oncology. You will be part of a fast-paced early-stage startup and have the opportunity to shape the overall direction of data science and product development.
***While we prefer this person to be onsite in Utrecht, we will consider remote with occasional travel to the office for this role***
Responsibilities
- Design and deploy advanced multimodal data algorithms to solve pressing problems in oncology assay development
- Rigorously and reproducibly support the design of experiments, perform statistical analyses, and develop quality control metrics and processes to drive product development
- Visualize and communicate complex data back to technical and non-technical audiencesOperate successfully in a rapidly changing, fast-paced, mission-driven environment
- Participate in external meetings with scientific experts from partner organizations and field technical questions on the data science performed
- Collaborate and co-develop products with our international Xilis R&D teams
- Serve as a conduit between Xilis’ Data Science team and the Netherlands R&D team by running point on data analytics for the Netherlands site, while working within and contributing to the international data science team’s infrastructure and processes
Requirements
- Ph.D. in data science, bioengineering/bioinformatics, or a related discipline with 8+ years of work experience or MS with 10+ years of work experience, each including industry experience (Bonus: Significant industry experience, particularly in drug discovery or drug development)
- Extensive knowledge of molecular biology, cancer genomics, and understanding the impacts of wetlab protocols on data analytics
- Extensive practical knowledge of image processing techniques (Bonus: deep practical knowledge of machine learning methodologies)
- Experience working with experimental scientists on Design of Experiment (DOE), drug screens, microscopy, and/or flow cytometry datasets (Bonus: Experience with bioinformatics (single-cell RNA-seq/NGS multi-omics), immune assays
- Expertise in some or all of Python, R and bash scripting)
- Experience working with cloud computing (AWS preferred), git
- Excellent verbal and written communication skills to accurately convey complex technical information to non-technical stakeholders
- Ability to work independently as an individual contributor in a fast-paced startup environment, delivering high-quality results under tight timelines (Bonus: Significant project management experience driving technical projects from conception to production environment with a focus on business value)
- Strong team player able to work together with your data science and wetlab teams as well as cross-functionally and across institutions to accomplish your goals (Bonus: Successful collaborations in geographically dispersed teams)
Xilis was created when its three founders — an engineer, a physician, and a biologist — decided to come together and commercialize their technology to transform cancer care. We are committed to building a team that represents a variety of backgrounds, perspectives, and skills. We do not discriminate on the basis of race, color, ancestry, religion, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, age, citizenship, marital status, disability, gender identity, or Veteran status. Furthermore, even if your work experience isn't perfectly aligned with what we've described above, if you're excited about what we're building then we want to talk to you!