Associate Director/Sr Research Investigator/Research Investigator, QSP & PBPK Methods

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Quantitative Systems Pharmacology (QSP) & Physiologically Based Pharmacokinetics (PBPK) have become important components of discovery and clinical development.

Mechanistic model and data characterization, calibration, and validation are critical aspects of QSP&PBPK modeling approaches needed during model development and application to establish confidence in models, confidence in their predictions, and leverage data to guide modeling efforts in impactful ways.

Our QSP&PBPK team has established expertise, impact, and tools to develop, calibrate, and apply QSP and PBPK models. We are searching for a scientist with expertise in model calibration algorithms and pipelines and strong coding experience to guide the team’s methodology and technology strategies, as well as future innovation.

Expertise with virtual population approaches is highly desired but advanced mathematical or statistical training and experience developing customized Bayesian algorithms would be a reasonable background.

This scientist will bring expertise in modeling and calibrating the population variability, characterizing uncertainty, and experience leading scripted toolbox and new method development.

Ideally the individual will also have interest in developing and deploying apps and tools for colleagues of various backgrounds as well as adapting approaches from machine learning.

The individual will play a critical role unifying the team’s technology strategy, maintaining technology and keeping code up-to-date, improving and adapting best practices and maintaining rigor in light of emerging regulatory guidelines for mechanistic modeling, mentoring modelers on the methods and technology, optimizing existing and new methods for efficiency to improve time-to-impact, and help with project deliverables to speed impact as part of a highly efficient, collaborative team.

Responsibilities :

Provide leadership for existing model calibration and computing capabilities and future model, technology, and algorithm innovation and development

Advance novel and rigorous methodologies for population variability calibration, model sensitivity analysis, and prediction uncertainty characterization

Advance existing and lead development of new tools that can be deployed using parallel resources on compute clusters with thousands of workers to accelerate characterization and calibration of ordinary differential equation models with substantial compute times in high dimensional spaces

Assist therapeutic area expert modelers to accelerate efforts and ensure timely model development and calibration to impact drug development programs and coordinate technology development

Maintain, advance, and coordinate codebases and documentation for data integration and analysis as well as model simulation, characterization, and calibration

Serve as a primary liaison with company Information Technology and coordinate QSP&PBPK group technology strategy

Partner with external groups to accelerate the internal efforts in key technology areas

Establish standards of practice within the department

Align QSP&PBPK technology strategy with organizational priorities

Network with stakeholders in other functions to facilitate methods, data, and model development and application

Serve as a subject matter expert to both internal colleagues and the external scientific community

Stay informed with emerging literature and science in the modeling and simulation sciences

Build and maintain a personal track record of publication in the area of QSP & PBPK methods

Maintain an active relationship with colleagues in Clinical Pharmacology, Pharmacometrics, & Bioanalysis at the project level as well as in the advancement of Pharmacometrics

Position requirements :

Ph.D. in Statistics, Applied Mathematics, Biomedical / Chemical Engineering, Computer Science, Physics, Computational Biology, or related field

M.S. in appropriate field with significantly more experience may be considered

Following the Ph.D., 2+ years of mathematical modeling & computer simulation experience in the pharmaceutical industry for the Sr.

Research Investigator level or 5+ years for the Associate Director level. No additional industry experience is needed for the Research Investigator level.

Experience within the pharmaceutical industry or pharmaceutical consulting is desired (academic post-doctoral or faculty may be a consideration depending on the totality of prior experience)

Excellent understanding of the theory and principles in optimization and global sensitivity analysis including topics such as particle swarm optimization, quadratic programming, variance-based global sensitivity analysis

Expertise in virtual population methods or related concepts and strategies for model calibration including applications of importance sampling and Bayesian algorithmic strategies (Markov Chain Monte Carlo, Metropolis Hastings, Sequential Monte Carlo, Likelihood-free methods)

Experience in modeling pathophysiology and therapies or related systems biology models with ordinary differential equations

Track record of developing scripted toolboxes for MATLAB and / or SimBiology, experience with version control, parallelization methods, experience profiling and optimizing code, and capability of quickly learning additional tools as needed such as R and Julia

Experience running code on clusters is preferable, including experience with resources such as MATLAB Parallel Server and / or workload managers such as SLURM or torque

Experience working with data integration as well as omics data sources and methods for their treatment is beneficial

Ability to learn new areas of quantitative sciences and build on solid foundation of skills to develop new algorithmic strategies

Ability to communicate internally and externally on topics related to model application and methodologies for QSP & PBPK in the context of Clinical Pharmacology is required

Desire to interact as a modeling and simulation expert with matrix project teams and working closely with experts from different functional areas (pre-clinical and clinical and multiple therapeutic areas)

For California or MA based role , the following applies :

Research Investigator : the starting compensation for this job is a range from $97,000 - $135,000, plus incentive cash and stock opportunities (based on eligibility).

Sr. Research Investigator : the starting compensation for this job is a range from $121,000 - $167,2000, plus incentive cash and stock opportunities (based on eligibility).

Associate Director : the starting compensation for this job is a range from $178.000 - $220,000, plus incentive cash and stock opportunities (based on eligibility).

The starting pay rate takes into account characteristics of the job, such as required skills and where the job is performed.

Final, individual compensation will be decided based on demonstrated experience.

Benefit offerings are subject to the terms and conditions of the applicable plans then in effect and may include the following : Medical, pharmacy, dental and vision care.

Wellbeing support such as the BMS Living Life Better program and employee assistance programs (EAP). Financial well-being resources and a 401(K).

Financial protection benefits such as short- and long-term disability, life insurance, supplemental health insurance, business travel protection and survivor support.

Work-life programs include paid national holidays and optional holidays, Global Shutdown days between Christmas and New Year’s holiday, up to 120 hours of paid vacation, up to two (2) paid days to volunteer, sick time off, and summer hours flexibility.

Parental, caregiver, bereavement, and military leave. Family care services such as adoption and surrogacy reimbursement, fertility / infertility benefits, support for traveling mothers, and child, elder and pet care resources.

Other perks like tuition reimbursement and a recognition program.

LI-Onsite

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On-site Protocol

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The occupancy type that you are assigned is determined by the nature and responsibilities of your role :

Site-essential roles require 100% of shifts onsite at your assigned facility. Site-by-design roles may be eligible for a hybrid work model with at least 50% onsite at your assigned facility.

For these roles, onsite presence is considered an essential job function and is critical to collaboration, innovation, productivity, and a positive Company culture.

For field-based and remote-by-design roles the ability to physically travel to visit customers, patients or business partners and to attend meetings on behalf of BMS as directed is an essential job function.

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