Postdoctoral Researcher

1 day ago Be among the first 25 applicants Postdoctoral Research Fellow – AI Cancer Care 📍 Vancouver, BC (Though most work will be done remotely) 🏛️ University of British Columbia | Faculty of Medicine ⏳ Full-time (1.0 FTE) | 12 months, with possibility of renewal 💰 Salary: $100,000 CAD per year About the Role The Nunez Laboratory in the Department of Psychiatry, Faculty of Medicine (UBC), in partnership with BC Cancer, is seeking a Postdoctoral Research Fellow to join a highly collaborative research program focused on developing and evaluating a patient-centered AI Cancer Care Navigation Assistant. This role sits at the intersection of applied NLP, AI, and cancer care, and offers close collaboration with clinicians, data scientists, software engineers, and patient partners. The successful candidate will also be integrated and co‑supervised with collaborators in the UBC Department of Computer Science and the Data Science Institute. Research Environment Dr. John‑Jose Nunez’s lab focuses on the application of artificial intelligence to mental health and cancer care, with an emphasis on real‑world clinical deployment, interpretability, and patient impact. The Fellow will collaborate closely with multidisciplinary teams at BC Cancer, including Supportive Care, Radiation Oncology, and Rehabilitation. Key Responsibilities Lead development of a patient‑facing AI Cancer Care Navigation Assistant, including predictive and generative NLP components Design and refine recommendation and retrieval systems connecting patients and caregivers to appropriate supportive resources Lead evaluation efforts using automated metrics, clinician review, and patient‑partner pilot testing, and translate findings into iterative system improvements Collaborate with multidisciplinary teams across UBC and BC Cancer, including clinical, technical, and patient‑partner stakeholders Supervise research assistants and trainees involved in data collection, analysis, and manuscript preparation Contribute to related AI and data science projects in cancer care and mental health Co‑develop knowledge translation outputs (e.g., social media, infographics, web‑based events) Lead and contribute to peer‑reviewed publications Support the development of future grant applications Required Qualifications PhD completed within the last 5 years in computer science, data science, biomedical engineering, computational linguistics, medical informatics, or a related field Demonstrated expertise in clinical and biomedical NLP, including both predictive modelling and foundation‑model‑based generative methods Hands‑on experience building end‑to‑end ML systems, including data preparation, training, evaluation, and reproducible pipelines Experience with retrieval and recommendation methods relevant to patient‑facing assistants (e.g., bi‑encoders, cross‑encoders, RAG) Strong programming skills in Python and modern deep learning frameworks Familiarity with MLOps, data governance for sensitive health data, and cloud platforms (e.g., AWS) Excellent communication, teamwork, and project management skills, with the ability to collaborate across clinical and technical domains Preferred Qualifications Experience working with large clinical text corpora and linked structured data Experience with oncology datasets or care navigation pathways Experience evaluating patient‑facing AI systems in healthcare, including ethics, safety, explainability, and user‑centered methods Experience with information retrieval or recommendation systems for health information Track record of peer‑reviewed publications and effective interdisciplinary collaboration Apply here: https://ubc.wd10.myworkdayjobs.com/ubcfacultyjobs/job/UBC-Hospital-Site---Vancouver-BC-Canada/Postdoctoral-Research-Fellow---AI-Cancer-Care_JR23131-1 #J-18808-Ljbffr