Postdoctoral Research Position: Language Models for Pediatric Data Analysis

Description

We are seeking an exceptional and highly motivated Postdoctoral Researcher to lead research on the in-hospital deployment of Large Language Models (LLMs). The focus of this position is the development, validation, and safe integration of locally hosted LLMs for automated coding of pediatric diagnoses from electronic health records (EHRs), with the goal of enhancing research capabilities and clinical data usability.

This position is embedded in a close collaboration between ETH Zurich’s Medical AI Lab and the University Children’s Hospital Basel (UKBB), enabling direct interaction with clinicians, clinical coders, and hospital IT infrastructure.

Responsibilities

The successful candidate will be responsible for adapting and developing locally hosted language models for diagnostic coding tasks. This will involve

• Model development
• Rigorous model validation on newly created benchmarks, and
• Safe deployment

Further activities and duties include:

• Publish research results in top-tier venues (e.g. leading biomedical journals or ML conferences).

Profile

• PhD in a relevant field (e.g., Computer Science, Medical AI, Medical informatics) or a closely related field
• Strong programming skills in Python and experience with modern ML/AI/LLM stacks (PyTorch, HuggingFace, Ollama, vllm, distributed training, verl, etc.)
• German proficiency and fluency at C1 level or higher, required for analyzing local patient records
• Prior experience with LLMs, clinical NLP, RAG, vector DBs is highly welcome
• Good computational engineering practices: version control, reproducible pipelines, batch job management, etc.
• Familiarity with Docker, local server environments, and GPU-based infrastructure
• Experience with medical data coding (ICD-10) and healthcare settings is a plus
• Ability to work independently, contribute to team efforts, and communicate effectively in English and German

Workplace

We offer

• A full-time postdoctoral position at ETH Zurich, one of the world’s leading research universities
• This project is a collaboration between our lab at ETH Zurich (D-BSSE located in Basel) and the University Children's Hospital Basel
• Our group is engaged with the ETH AI Center and SwissAI initiative, giving our group members access to this vibrant and world-class AI community
• Access to cutting-edge computational resources, including large GPU clusters, as well as clinical collaborations
• Employment in a highly interdisciplinary environment at Department of Biosystems Science and Engineering (D-BSSE) located in Basel, embedded in a major hub for medical and life science and biotech research