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Research Engineer, Model Evaluation and Improvement

Join Benchling as a Research Engineer to improve AI models for scientific applications in a fast-paced, collaborative environment.

Location
San Francisco, CA, United States
Compensation
Not disclosed
Level
mid
Type
full time · On-site

Posted by employer 1 day ago

First seen on Joblaze 1 day ago

Last verified on the company career page 1 day ago

Apply at Benchling → Save job Scanned from benchling.com

Skills & Technologies

What you'll build

  • Build datasets for evaluating and improving frontier models
  • Analyze model failure modes
  • Build scalable data infrastructure
  • Collaborate with frontier AI labs
  • Work closely with scientists

Must have

  • 2+ years at the intersection of biology and AI
  • Experience building with LLMs

Nice to have

  • Curiosity about frontier AI
  • Collaborative mindset
  • Desire to work in a fast-paced environment

Practical constraints

  • Employees are expected to be on-site 5 days per week

AI in the day-to-day

Scientists use Benchling to run AI agents and models directly in their workflows.

Requirements

Experience
2+ years

Not disclosed in this posting: compensation, visa sponsorship.

Joblaze summary

In this role, the Research Engineer focuses on developing datasets and evaluation systems to enhance AI models for scientific applications. The position requires expertise in both biology and AI, particularly in working with large language models to identify their limitations and improve their performance. Ideal candidates have a background in evaluating scientific models and a collaborative mindset, as they will work closely with scientists and AI labs. Benchling emphasizes in-office collaboration, fostering a dynamic environment for innovation.

Joblaze insights

  • Listed yesterday — first seen on Joblaze November 6, 2026. Last confirmed on Benchling's careers page November 6, 2026.
  • This exact title is also open at 1 other location at Benchling: San Francisco, CA.
  • AI/ML appears in 53.3% of 467 comparable mid ai/ml roles in United States; LLMs appears in 2.4% of 467 comparable mid ai/ml roles in United States.

Quick facts

Is the Research Engineer, Model Evaluation and Improvement role remote?
No — this is an on-site role in San Francisco, CA, United States.
How much experience is required?
At least 2 years of relevant experience for this Research Engineer, Model Evaluation and Improvement role.
Where is the role based?
Benchling is hiring for this position in San Francisco, CA, United States.
What's the tech stack?
Joblaze extracted these technologies from the posting: AI/ML, LLMs.
What seniority level is this role?
Benchling targets mid-level candidates for this position.
Is this full-time or contract?
Full-time for this Research Engineer, Model Evaluation and Improvement role at Benchling.

From the original posting

ROLE OVERVIEW

We’re a team focused on making frontier AI models better at science. LLMs know an extraordinary amount of biology, but there’s still a large gap in reasoning for the real-world problems scientists face every day. We recently published some of our work here.

You’ll build the datasets, evaluations, and systems that help close that gap. You’ll work with scientists to turn complex scientific work into rigorous tasks that models can learn from and be evaluated against. You’ll partner with leading AI labs to understand where models fail and how to improve them.

This is an early and rapidly evolving area. You’ll work at the intersection of software engineering, biology, and frontier AI: finding tasks that are challenging for LLMs and valuable to scientists, designing evaluations that capture real scientific judgment, and building systems to create these tasks at scale.

 

RESPONSIBILITIES

  • Build datasets for evaluating and improving frontier models, turning complex scientific data into high-quality tasks and environments for LLMs.

  • Analyze model failure modes, running experiments across frontier models to understand where they struggle and identify opportunities for improvement.

  • Build scalable data infrastructure, creating pipelines that curate, transform, and validate large volumes of scientific data into tasks for model evaluation and improvement.

  • Collaborate with frontier AI labs, helping develop and evaluate new approaches for improving models on challenging scientific tasks.

  • Work closely with scientists, translating expert judgment into problems and evaluation criteria that can reliably distinguish strong model behavior.

 

QUALIFICATIONS

  • 2+ years at the intersection of biology and AI, with academic or industry experience evaluating and improving scientific models or LLMs for biological applications.

  • Experience building with LLMs, with an intuition for where current models excel, where they struggle, and how to design systems around their capabilities.

  • Curiosity and excitement about frontier AI, with a desire to understand and push the capabilities of rapidly improving models.

  • Comfort working on ambiguous problems, where the playing field is rapidly shifting and the right technical approaches are still being discovered.

  • Collaborative mindset, able to work closely with engineers, scientists, and external research partners.

  • Desire to work in a fast-paced environment, where priorities can shift and rapid experimentation is encouraged.

 

HOW WE WORK

We prioritize in-office collaboration. Employees are expected to be on-site 5 days per week (Monday - Friday).

#LI-KW

Standard company text repeated across Benchling's postings is omitted here.

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