Job Description

Be a part of the legacy: Postdoctoral Research Fellow Program

Our Research Laboratories’ Postdoctoral Research Fellow Program aims to be a best-in-industry program for industrial postdoctoral researchers, designed to provide you with an academic focus in a commercial environment. With the resources, reach, and expertise of a large pharmaceutical company, postdoctoral researchers will be positioned to excel in an institution committed to breakthrough innovation in research and discovery.

About Our Company

We are a global biopharmaceutical leader with a diverse portfolio of prescription medicines, oncology, vaccines and animal health products.

We are driven by our purpose to develop and deliver innovative products that save and improve lives. With 69,000 employees operating in more than 140 countries, we offer state of the art laboratories, plants and offices that are designed to inspire our employees as we learn, develop and grow in our careers.  We are proud of our over 125 years of service to humanity and continue to be one of the world’s biggest investors in Research & Development.

We are seeking a Postdoctoral Researcher to join our Data-Rich Experimentation (DRE) organization, within Process Research & Developing Enabling Technologies (PR&D ET), located in Rahway, NJ.

Primary Responsibilities

In this role, the chosen candidate will work with a team of scientists tasked with identifying, developing, and deploying data-rich technologies aimed at improving the quality and rate with at process development is conducted. The tools that we develop are as diverse as the team developing them, and in this Postdoctoral Researcher role, the chosen candidate will leverage cheminformatics, machine learning, optimization, and other innovative data science approaches to enable our process research and development efforts especially within our Company's mall-molecule API portfolio.

Our DRE organization is responsible for the invention and application of new data-rich tools to support the scientists across process research and development at our Company. We aspire to embed data-intense technologies into the fabric of our Company's process development culture. This Postdoctoral Researcher role will be a scientific position on that team tasked with inventing and applying new methodologies for accelerating process research with cutting techniques from the fields of optimization, deep learning, and synthetic organic cheminformatics. Ultimately, through the development, application, and deployment of these capabilities across our pipeline, we aim to commercialize our processes faster, consuming less resources, with improved outcomes, and with better understanding to enhance our organization’s ability to support a complex and diverse portfolio.

In this Postdoctoral Researcher role, the chosen candidate will greatly leverage approaches in applied mathematics and data science to help advance process-focused scientific research. This includes, but is not limited to, advancing our approach to active learning, AI-assisted experiment design, and autonomous optimization with novel methods; developing and applying new approaches for small-molecule representation learning; and designing and testing new architectures for hybrid mechanistic/data-driven models for chemical reaction inference and optimization. As such, the chosen candidate should have a robust background in machine learning, with an emphasis on optimization and the application to synthetic organic chemistry.

In addition to a passion for machine learning, the chosen candidate should have excellent interpersonal, communication, and collaboration skills. The chosen candidate should embrace and model our core values of diversity and inclusion, including fostering a supportive culture where all can thrive. The chosen candidate should be able to effectively collaborate in a dynamic, integrated, and multidisciplinary team environment. The chosen candidate should demonstrate a clear ability to perform impactful scientific innovation in a team-oriented manner that builds trusted partnerships across vast stakeholder networks. The chosen candidate should have a demonstrated ability to publish and present research, including an established track record of interaction with the broader academic community. The chosen candidate will join a diverse group of scientific problem solvers who are dedicated to creating the life-changing medicines and vaccines of tomorrow.

Education Minimum Requirement:

• A Ph.D. in Chemistry, Engineering, Biochemistry, Mathematics, Physics, Biology, Pharmaceutical Sciences, or a closely-related field

Required Experience and Skills:

• Background in machine learning, computational data analytics, optimization, statistical science, or applied mathematics with a functional knowledge or experience in chemical/biological sciences

• Proficiency in Python programming or scripting for data analysis or scientific machine learning

• Highly-motivated and technology-centric scientist that is passionate about modernizing our Company's chemical process development practices

• Demonstrated scientific ability through publications and presentations in scientific conferences.

• Excellent communication skills, demonstrated creativity, and effective interpersonal skills.

• Ability to deliver complex solutions under compressed timelines in a dynamic environment.

• Ability to work in a team environment with cross-functional interactions.

Preferred Experience and Skills:

• Experience in chemical or bioprocess development including a functional knowledge of laboratory chemical process development

• Direct experience in wet-lab chemical process development, especially using data-rich or high-throughput laboratory robotics

• Fluency in Python and the common libraries which support computational data analysis and visualization (Pandas, NumPy, SciPy, Matplotlib, Plotly)

• Proficiency with a broad range of traditional machine learning algorithms for supervised and unsupervised learning, plus the programming libraries which enable them (scikit-learn, XGBoost/LightGBM, statsmodels)

• Experience with at least one library for deep learning (Keras, Tensorflow, PyTorch)

• Experience with cheminformatics or QSAR for synthetic organic chemistry and the programming libraries which enable them (rdkit, chemprop)

• Proficiency in optimization, active learning, and optimal experiment design

• Experience in new technology research, including a demonstrated track record of identifying, developing, and deploying data-rich tools and methodologies.

• Collaborative research efforts that are praised by the broader scientific community and are exemplary of a multidisciplinary group.

• Motivated to learn new skills, willingness to take on new challenges, and scientific curiosity.

#PostdoctoralOpportunities

Post Doc: 
Under New York City, Colorado State, Washington State, and California State law, the Company is required to provide a reasonable estimate of the salary range for this job. Final determinations with respect to salary will take into account a number of factors, which may include, but not be limited to the primary work location and the chosen candidate’s relevant skills, experience, and education.

Expected salary range:

$75,000.00-$86,000.00

Available benefits include bonus eligibility, health care and other insurance benefits (for employee and family), retirement benefits, paid holidays, vacation, and sick days. For Washington State Jobs, a summary of benefits is listed here.

Current Employees apply HERE

Current Contingent Workers apply HERE

US and Puerto Rico Residents Only:

Our company is committed to inclusion, ensuring that candidates can engage in a hiring process that exhibits their true capabilities. Please click here if you need an accommodation during the application or hiring process.

We are an Equal Opportunity Employer, committed to fostering an inclusive and diverse workplace.  All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, age, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, protected veteran status, or disability status, or other applicable legally protected characteristics.  For more information about personal rights under the U.S. Equal Opportunity Employment laws, visit:

EEOC Know Your Rights

EEOC GINA Supplement​

Pay Transparency Nondiscrimination

We are proud to be a company that embraces the value of bringing diverse, talented, and committed people together. The fastest way to breakthrough innovation is when diverse ideas come together in an inclusive environment. We encourage our colleagues to respectfully challenge one another’s thinking and approach problems collectively.

Learn more about your rights, including under California, Colorado and other US State Acts

U.S. Hybrid Work Model

Effective September 5, 2023, employees in office-based positions in the U.S. will be working a Hybrid work consisting of three total days on-site per week, Monday - Thursday, although the specific days may vary by site or organization, with Friday designated as a remote-working day, unless business critical tasks require an on-site presence.This Hybrid work model does not apply to, and daily in-person attendance is required for, field-based positions; facility-based, manufacturing-based, or research-based positions where the work to be performed is located at a Company site; positions covered by a collective-bargaining agreement (unless the agreement provides for hybrid work); or any other position for which the Company has determined the job requirements cannot be reasonably met working remotely. Please note, this Hybrid work model guidance also does not apply to roles that have been designated as “remote”.

San Francisco Residents Only: We will consider qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records for employment in compliance with the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance

Los Angeles Residents Only: We will consider for employment all qualified applicants, including those with criminal histories, in a manner consistent with the requirements of applicable state and local laws, including the City of Los Angeles’ Fair Chance Initiative for Hiring Ordinance

Search Firm Representatives Please Read Carefully 
Merck & Co., Inc., Rahway, NJ, USA, also known as Merck Sharp & Dohme LLC, Rahway, NJ, USA, does not accept unsolicited assistance from search firms for employment opportunities. All CVs / resumes submitted by search firms to any employee at our company without a valid written search agreement in place for this position will be deemed the sole property of our company.  No fee will be paid in the event a candidate is hired by our company as a result of an agency referral where no pre-existing agreement is in place. Where agency agreements are in place, introductions are position specific. Please, no phone calls or emails. 

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