United Therapeutics is seeking to develop treatments for rare, deadly diseases and create manufactured organs to address the shortage of kidneys, hearts, lungs, and livers available for transplant, and the computational systems biology lab is building an in-silico model of the lung to support drug development
Requirements
- Experience with implementation of modeling and simulation (either PDE-based fluid dynamics, ODE-based signaling models, or agent-based modeling) or bioinformatics / machine learning skills (project-dependent)
- Proficiency in at least one of the following: R, Python, Julia, Matlab, or other programming language
- Implementation of mathematical models using version control systems
- Statistical / machine learning approaches to analyze large-scale molecular data
- Mechanistic ODE-based models of signaling pathways relevant to lung physiology and drug response
- Quantitative systems pharmacology approaches to assist with clinical development objectives
- Agent-based modeling to represent behavior of cell populations on tissue engineered scaffolds
Responsibilities
- Conduct research on mathematical modeling approaches to add new features to the in-silico lung model; evaluate suitability for addressing research questions and feasibility of implementation
- Identify data in the literature and public repositories suitable for training and validating mathematical models
- Implement mathematical models by developing well-documented code using version control systems
- Present plans and results regularly to members of the computational lab and other scientists within the company
- Simulate the complex interplay between lung tissue mechanics and fluid dynamics (either air or blood), with a focus on how mechanical alterations due to disease conditions can affect clinical measurements related to hemodynamics and pulmonary function testing
- Apply statistical / machine learning approaches to analyze large-scale molecular data (transcriptomics, proteomics, etc.) to derive insights into lung function and drug response
- Generate mechanistic ODE-based models of signaling pathways relevant to lung physiology and drug response, and apply quantitative systems pharmacology approaches to assist with clinical development objectives
Other
- Candidates are expected to be actively enrolled in a Master's or PhD program in a science/engineering discipline
- Available to work 40 hours/week onsite in Silver Spring, MD
- Highly self-motivated
- Excellent teamwork skills
- Strong writing and communication skills
