Senior Machine Learning Engineer, Wellcome
£65.4-81.7k
More information about location
3 days a week in office (Euston Road, London)
Global charitable foundation for science research
Be an early applicant
Global charitable foundation for science research
1001+ employees
Be an early applicant
£65.4-81.7k
More information about location
3 days a week in office (Euston Road, London)
1001+ employees
Company mission
Wellcome's mission is to support science to solve the urgent health challenges facing everyone.
Role
Who you are
- We are looking for an experienced senior machine learning engineer who has a passion for our mission in reducing global health inequalities to join our team.
- If you have a deep understanding of machine learning concepts and techniques and enjoy working on complex problems and making impactful contribution.
- Continuous learning and tackling challenging problems will further hone your skills, keeping you at the forefront of the rapidly evolving field of machine learning
- Advanced degree (MSc or PhD) in a quantitative field such as machine learning, data science, computer science, statistics, engineering or mathematics
- Strong Python and SQL skills with a grounding in software engineering best practices
- In-depth understanding of a deep learning framework such as PyTorch, TensorFlow or JAX
- Strong knowledge of modern natural language processing techniques, large language and transformer models, and libraries such as Hugging Face, VLLM and LangChain
- Proven experience owning the development of large scale, high impact machine learning solutions from initial experimentation through to deployment
- Strong knowledge of data science libraries such as Polars, Pandas, NumPy, Scikit-learn
- Knowledge of MLOps tooling such as Weights & Biases, AirFlow, AWS SageMaker or Docker
- Experience working with cloud platforms such as AWS, Azure or GCP
- Experience working collaboratively in a multidisciplinary team
What the job involves
- You will have the opportunity to work on and lead specific machine learning projects across Wellcome Trust with particular emphasis on working with open-source software to develop natural language processing and computer vision to create search algorithms and tools
- Identify opportunities where machine learning can help Wellcome make better decisions
- Translate business problems to data science tasks and present complex results to stakeholders
- Develop and evaluate machine learning models with an emphasis on natural language processing
- Collaborate on a cross-functional team, sharing ideas, knowledge and reviewing code
- Maintaining and improving our internal data pipelines and machine learning tooling
- Contribute to a diverse and inclusive culture across both the department and the organisation
Application process
- Closing date: Tuesday 8 September 2026
- Interviews: w/c 21 September 2026
Salary benchmarks
Our take
The Wellcome Trust was originally founded in 1936 to fund medical research and has since grown into the UK’s largest private scientific research fund, and one of the wealthiest charities in the world. Disbursing over £1 billion in funds a year, it has provided funding to numerous medical research projects in its focus areas of mental health, climate & health and infectious diseases. These include the Cancer Genome Project and the Ebola Emergency Initiative.
Wellcome's 2022 decision to divest itself of its shares in fossil fuels has also relieved it of a persistent source of controversy, as this was potentially hindering the credibility of its climate change research. Wellcome has since partnered with the World Economic Forum to collect data on how climate change is affecting health worldwide.
The company is also moving to adjust to a more global role. The majority of its funding has historically been allocated to UK firms, but as climate change and infectious diseases know no borders, neither does research into solutions to these problems. In 2019, it established an office in Berlin to strengthen its scientific links in the EU and to allow it to more easily fund important research outside of the UK.
Steph
Company Specialist at Welcome to the Jungle
Insights
6% employee growth in 12 months
Company
Company benefits
- Holiday – 25 days’ holiday a year plus bank holidays (and we usually close between Christmas and New Year)
- Pension (defined contribution plan) – you contribute at least 3% and we pay in 15% of your salary
- Income protection – to maintain your income if you have a prolonged illness or disability
- Life assurance – four to six times your basic salary if you’re a member of our pension plan
- Interest-free travel season ticket loan
- Private medical insurance – we pay the cover, you pay the tax (and you can pay to add dependants)
- Gym and fitness classes – free membership to on-site gym and subsidised fitness classes and treatments
- Employee assistance programme – free, independent 24/7 help and advice for work-related issues as well as problems affecting your home life
- Mental health support – our network of mental health first aiders can be a first point of contact, or help while you're receiving professional help
- Health assessments (free and voluntary) – after you’ve been here for one year, then every two years after that
- Occupational health – annual eye tests and flu jabs, as well as job-related vaccinations
- Flexible working – we make every effort to support flexible working, including flexible working hours and remote working (we respect people's different working preferences and the need for a healthy work-life balance)
- Flexi-leave scheme – you can buy or sell up to five days of your holiday entitlement a year
- Staff social club – a range of sports teams and fun events throughout the year
- Volunteering – we give you up to four days' paid leave a year to contribute to our local community
- Give As You Earn – allows you to make tax-free donations to the charities you care about
- Cycle-to-work scheme – we offer at least 25% discount on bikes and cycling equipment and we have secure cycle storage, lockers and showers
- Subsidised restaurant and cafe
- Wellcome Collection discounts – 20% off food, drink and gifts from our cafe, restaurant and shop
- Discounts through Perkbox – shopping, restaurants, cinema tickets, phone insurance and gift cards
Company HQ
London, UK
Leadership
Jeremy Farrar
(Director)Has been Director of the Wellcome Trust since 2013. Before that was Director of Oxford Clinical Research Unit, working on research and clinical trials for diseases in Vietnam.
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