Postdoctoral Scholar (Goldstein Lab)

Department: MED-Pathology
Salary/Grade: RES/

The minimum pay for this position is $61,000 in alignment with departmental equity and market data

Who we are: A small lab dedicated to improving maternal-child outcomes through understanding of the placenta.

(wait, what's a placenta?) An organ that develops in pregnancy that supports fetal survival and growth. Most problems in pregnancy are caused by the placenta or leave a signature that we can study.

What we do: Our major techniques are ML analysis of whole slide placental histology images and analysis of spatial multiplex data (transcriptomics, IF). We also use medical informatics data for outcomes. Goldstein lab space is dry, but we work with collaborators and core labs to acquire data.

• Chou et al., Quantitative Modeling to Characterize Maternal Inflammatory Response of Histologic Chorioamnionitis in Placental Membranes. Am J Reprod Immunol. 2024 Oct;92(4):e13944. doi: 10.1111/aji.13944.

• Ayad et al., "Deep learning for fetal inflammatory response diagnosis in the umbilical cord." Placenta. 2025 Jun 26;167:1-10. doi: 10.1016/j.placenta.2025.04.013

The project: Stillbirth is loss of pregnancy after 20 (of 40) weeks gestation. It occurs in ~1% of pregnancies, and the cause is unknown in around half of cases. The goal of the project is to build multimodal models that intake clinical data and whole slide images and yield a classification of the cause of stillbirth. The position is on an NIH-funded R01 in year 2 of 5.

This fellow will collaborate with an interdisciplinary team of machine learning, image analysis, and software engineering experts and will have access to data and resources to develop, validate, and translate their work. Candidates must have strong computational skills and a PhD with research experience in ML or computationally intensive biology. Preference will be given to recent graduates of US institutions or who are currently employed in the US and who are immediately eligible to work.

The Division of Computational Pathology at Northwestern was formed to improve pathology practice and research through the application of AI techniques. We have created a research environment where pathologists and computational scientists from different backgrounds collaborate to develop AI tools and translate them into clinical practice. We maintain an institutional repository containing >100,000 images linked to diagnostic and clinical data, a dedicated computing cluster, and a platform for image viewing, annotation, and data management. Our hospital system is implementing digital pathology for clinical operations and has experience with operationalizing AI tools.

This position is supervised by Dr. Jeffery A. Goldstein and the primary appointment will be in the department of pathology on the Downtown Chicago Streeterville campus. Northwestern has a vibrant AI research community, with the Institute of Augmented Intelligence in Medicine and AI@NU. The fellow will have opportunities to collaborate with Lee Cooper, head of the division of computational pathology, as well as other faculty in the Department of Pathology, Prentice Women's Hospital, the Lurie Cancer Center, and the McCormick School of Engineering.

Principle Responsibilities:

• Develop methods for analyzing pathology images

• Management of research datasets

• Interact with collaborators, other postdocs, and graduate students to achieve project goals

• Manuscript development

• Attendance at conferences and symposia where results will be presented in poster or talk formats

Requirements:

• PhD in computer science, computational biology, bioinformatics or similar.

• Advanced level of Python programming

• Experience working with Linux-based systems

Preferred

• Experience with software optimization and large-scale datasets

• Experience with Git version control
• Experience in computer vision and deep learning

• Experience with medical images

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Northwestern University is an Equal Opportunity Employer and does not discriminate on the basis of protected characteristics, including disability and veteran status. View Northwestern's non-discrimination statement. Job applicants who wish to request an accommodation in the application or hiring process should contact the Office of Civil Rights and Title IX Compliance. View additional information on the accommodations process.