The University of Arizona

Senior Software Engineer

The University of Arizona$117K — $153K *
Information Technology
8 - 10 years of experience
Job Overview by Ladders

Qualifications

  • Bachelor's degree in Computer Science or related field or equivalent experience required.
  • Minimum of 8 years of relevant work experience is required.
  • Experience setting software engineering standards across a team preferred.
  • Experience designing and operating production-grade cloud services preferred.
  • Mastery in architecting LLM-based agentic systems preferred.

Responsibilities

  • Architect and lead the development of AI systems for scientific research.
  • Translate open-ended research problems into production-quality system designs.
  • Design, write, and evaluate algorithms and workflows for genomics data.
  • Develop command-line tools, APIs, and cloud-based web services.
  • Establish and maintain software engineering practices across the group.
  • Implement and administer workflow systems and cloud deployments.
  • Provide technical leadership and mentoring to junior team members.

Benefits

  • Full benefits package available.
  • Supportive and collaborative academic environment.
  • Opportunities for professional growth and mentorship.
  • Access to advanced computational resources and technologies.
Full Job Description
Senior Software Engineer

Posting Number
req26695

Department
Pharmacy Practice and Science

Department Website Link
https://www.pharmacy.arizona.edu/departments-directory/pharmacy-practice-science-department

Location
Tucson Campus

Address
Tucson, AZ USA

Position Highlights

The Department of Pharmacy Practice and Science trains pharmacist and scientist leaders in patient-centered care, interprofessional practice, and patient and population-oriented research. We are seeking an experienced and high-performing software developer with expertise in software engineering and agentic AI infrastructure, along with enthusiasm for working with a mid-sized academic team to develop optimized software and workflows for genomic and proteomic data analysis. The selected candidate will lead development efforts for both high-performance command-line analysis software and cloud-based web services.

Visa sponsorship is not available for this position.

Duties & Responsibilities
  • Architect and lead development of agentic AI systems for scientific research, including multi-agent orchestration, tool-use and retrieval infrastructure, model serving and evaluation pipelines, and the abstractions that let LLM-driven agents reliably perform data wrangling, visualization, and analysis.
  • Responsible for translating open-ended research problems into production-quality system designs, selecting and integrating model and framework technologies, and establishing engineering standards that keep these systems robust, observable, reproducible, and maintainable at scale.
  • Design, write, and evaluate algorithms, software, workflows, and data management architectures supporting large-scale genomics and molecular dynamics data. Programming languages will include Python for agentic infrastructure, data management, and analysis, and Rust for speed-optimized algorithm implementations.
  • Projects will entail development of command line tools, APIs, and cloud-based web services (both public and private cloud).
  • Establish and maintain industry-grade software engineering practice across the research group, including testing, continuous integration and deployment, documentation, release management, security and credential handling, and cost and resource monitoring.
  • Provide implementation and administration of workflow systems, containerization frameworks, and deployment onto national computational infrastructure such as DOE and NSF-supported HPC and cloud resources.
  • Provide technical leadership, mentoring, and training for software engineers, graduate students, and undergraduate researchers, including code review, architectural guidance, and establishing shared engineering conventions.
  • Contribute to grant development, strategic planning of the group's technical direction, and representation of the group's software and AI infrastructure work to collaborators, funding agencies, and the broader scientific community.

Knowledge, Skills and Abilities:
  • Ability to turn open-ended problems into concrete system architectures.
  • Ability to communicate effectively in both technical and non-technical contexts.
  • Ability to mentor and technically lead junior software engineers.


This job posting reflects the general nature and level of work expected of the selected candidate(s). It is not intended to be an exhaustive list of all duties and responsibilities. The institution reserves the right to amend or update this description as organizational priorities and institutional needs evolve.

Minimum Qualifications
  • Bachelor's degree in Computer Science or related field, or equivalent advanced learning attained through professional level experience required.
  • Minimum of 8 years of relevant work experience is required.


Preferred Qualifications
  • Experience setting software engineering standards across a team.
  • Experience designing and operating production-grade cloud services.
  • Mastery architecting LLM-based agentic systems, including orchestration, tool use, and evaluation.
  • Mastery with Linux, HPC, and cloud environments.


FLSA
Exempt

Full Time/Part Time
Full Time

Number of Hours Worked per Week
40

Job FTE
1.0

Work Calendar
Fiscal

Job Category
Research

Benefits Eligible
Yes - Full Benefits

Rate of Pay
$117,883 - $153,248

Compensation Type
salary at 1.0 full-time equivalency (FTE)

Grade
13

Compensation Guidance
The Rate of Pay Field represents the University of Arizona's good faith and reasonable estimate of the range of possible compensation at the time of posting. The University considers several factors when extending an offer, including but not limited to, the role and associated responsibilities, a candidate's work experience, education/training, key skills, and internal equity.

The Grade Range represent a full range of career compensation growth over time. The university offers compensation growth opportunities within its career architecture. To learn more about compensation, please review our Applicant Compensation Guide and our Total Rewards Calculator.

Career Stream and Level
PC4

Job Family
Research Engineering

Job Function
Research

Type of criminal background check required:
Name-based criminal background check (non-security sensitive)

Number of Vacancies
1

Target Hire Date

Expected End Date

Contact Information for Candidates
Travis Wheeler I [email protected]

Open Date
8/4/2026

Open Until Filled
Yes

Documents Needed to Apply
Resume, Cover Letter, and One Additional Document

Special Instructions to Applicant
Additional Document Request: Please provide the contact information for three professional references who have direct knowledge of your work experience and performance. References may include current or former supervisors, managers, or professional colleagues. Family members and personal friends should not be listed unless specifically requested.

About The University of Arizona

The University of Arizona is a public research university in Tucson, Arizona. Founded in 1885, the UA was the first university in the Arizona Territory. As of 2021, the university enrolls 45,918 students in 19 separate colleges/schools, including the University of Arizona College of Medicine in Tucson and Phoenix and the James E. Rogers College of Law, and is affiliated with two academic medical centers (Banner - University Medical Center Tucson and Banner - University Medical Center Phoenix). The University of Arizona is one of the elected members of the Association of American Universities (an organization of North America's premier research institutions) and is the only representative from the state of Arizona to this group. UA athletes have won national titles in several sports, most notably men's basketball, baseball, and softball. The official colors of the university and its athletic teams are cardinal red and navy blue.
Learn more about The University of Arizona
Size
15,000 employees
Industry

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