"Post-Doctoral Fellow"

Post-Doctoral Fellow

University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus

Department: Biomedical Informatics

Job Title: Postdoctoral Fellow

Position #: 00844193 - Requisition #: 38691

Job Summary:

The Gao Lab at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus welcomes applications for a Postdoctoral Fellow focused on foundational and system-level research in large language models.

Dr. Gao's lab advances foundational and system-level language technologies with the goal of enabling reliable, efficient, and clinically meaningful real-world applications, particularly in medicine and health. The lab conducts method-driven research in natural language processing (NLP) and artificial intelligence (AI), with an emphasis on LLM reasoning, uncertainty quantification, interpretability, and knowledge-augmented modeling. By studying and improving how LLMs are trained, calibrated, and deployed, the lab aims to build principled AI systems that can be integrated into high-stakes healthcare environments. We seek candidates whose research interests and working style align with a collaborative and principled research environment. Additional information about the lab's philosophy and values is available on the lab website (www.larknlp.com).

Example research directions include (but are not limited to):

• Methodological advances in large language models for efficiency, reliability, and controllability
• Learning and calibration strategies for uncertainty-aware language model prediction
• Knowledge-augmented and neuro-symbolic approaches for language-based reasoning
• Evaluation and design of LLM-based systems for high-stakes real-world applications

Responsibilities also include contributing to the ideation and design of new studies, managing data cleaning and wrangling efforts, and preparing scientific communications such as abstracts, oral and poster presentations, scientific manuscripts, and research grant proposals. The projects within the lab aim to transform healthcare through AI by improving the accuracy and efficiency of medical diagnostics and patient care documentation processes.

The postdoc and PI will jointly envision projects tailored to the fellow's skillset and long-term career goals. Postdocs will be expected to carry out computational research, develop novel AI and NLP methods, analyze data, and disseminate their findings, software, and data to the biomedical community. The postdoc will also join a highly interactive, supportive, and interdisciplinary group of faculty, staff scientists, postdoctoral fellows, engineers, and students in Department for Biomedical Informatics. They will enjoy access to state-of-the-art equipment and facilities on the Anschutz Medical Campus.

Key Responsibilities:

Research (65%)

• Investigate literatures to identify existing solutions and the problem
• Develop and apply state-of-the-art natural language processing algorithms and models to multimodal data (unstructured and structured text, knowledge graph, etc)
• Design and conduct experiments to test hypotheses with applied statistics
• Analyze and interpret results, present research progress to meetings with PIs, and publish results to peer-reviewed manuscripts in conference proceedings and journals
• Assist PI with grant writing

Communication (15%)

• Present research progress at lab meeting and project meetings with collaborators
• Prepare abstract/manuscripts for journal and conference paper submission, present at the local and international conferences.

Mentoring and collaboration (10%)

• Mentor and train other group members, such as graduate and undergraduate students.
• Pursue computational, experimental, and clinical collaborations.

Career development (5%)

• Work with the PI to develop and progress the candidate's career goals.
• Attend career development seminars and networking events.

Administrative Duties (5%)

• Complete required research training.
• Perform general administrative duties as requested by the PI.

Work Location: Hybrid - this role is eligible for a hybrid schedule of 3 days per week on campus and as needed for in-person meetings.

Qualifications:

Minimum Qualifications:

• PhD in Computer Science, Artificial Intelligence, Computational Linguistics, Machine learning, Computer Engineering or related fields

Preferred Qualifications:

• Strong experience implementing and training deep learning models in PyTorch, with attention to efficiency, scalability, and reproducibility
• Demonstrated experience with NLP state-of-the-art models (Deepseek, Llama, Mistral, GPT-4, BERT etc)
• Experience with large language models beyond prompt engineering, such as fine-tuning, distillation, calibration, or representation analysis
• Familiarity with multimodal modeling, programmatic or structured generation, or model-based content generation
• Experience with retrieval-augmented generation, agentic or multi-stage workflows, or knowledge-integrated models
• A strong publication record in top-tier AI/NLP venues (ACL, EMNLP, NeurIPS, ICLR, AAAI, etc.)
• Experience with biomedical dataset and electronic health record is preferred, but not a must

Knowledge, Skills and Abilities:

• Proficiency in scientific communication as evidenced by peer-reviewed conference proceedings (journals) manuscripts and presentations at national or international conferences.

How to Apply: For full consideration, please submit the following document(s):

1. A letter of interest describing relevant job experiences as they relate to listed job qualifications and interest in the position
2. Curriculum vitae / Resume
3. Five professional references including name, address, phone number (mobile number if appropriate), and email address

Applications are accepted electronically ONLY at www.cu.edu/cu-careers.

Questions should be directed to: Yanjun Gao, yanjun.gao@cuanschutz.edu

Screening of Applications Begins: Immediately and continues until position is filled. For best consideration, apply by February 1, 2026.

Anticipated Pay Range:

HIRING RANGE: $73,000