Graduate Research Co-op - AI & Representation Learning

About Ancestry:

When you join Ancestry, you join a human-centered company where every person’s story is important. Ancestry®, the global leader in family history, connects everyone with their past so they can discover, preserve, and share their unique family stories. With our unparalleled collection of more than 65 billion records, over 3.5 million subscribers, and over 27 million people in our growing DNA network, customers can discover their family story and gain a new level of understanding about their lives. Over the past 40 years, we’ve built trusted relationships with millions of people who have chosen us as the platform for discovering, preserving, and sharing the most important information about themselves and their families.

We are committed to our location flexible work approach, allowing you to choose to work in the nearest office, from your home, or a hybrid of both (subject to location restrictions and roles that are required to be in the office- see the full list of eligible US locations HERE). We will continue to hire and promote beyond the boundaries of our office locations, to enable broadened possibilities for employee diversity.

Together, we work every day to foster a work environment that's inclusive as well as diverse, and where our people can be themselves. Every idea and perspective is valued so that our products and services reflect the global and diverse clients we serve. 

Ancestry encourages applications from minorities, women, the disabled, protected veterans and all other qualified applicants. Passionate about dedicating your work to enriching people’s lives? Join the curious.

We are looking for candidates with strong experience in genomic data analysis and enthusiasm in human populations and/or family history. Through regular mentorship from our scientists, you will gain valuable research experience for the next step in your career. You will have the opportunity to apply cutting edge computational and statistical approaches to the largest database of human genome and pedigree data in the world. You will develop methods to help millions of people understand their ancestry, their family, and themselves. Help us make an impact in this exciting field!

Join the DNA Science team as a Co-op and conduct innovative research on the world’s largest genomic and pedigree database to further our knowledge on human populations and family history. This is a part-time, work-study focused position for 6 months intended for active master's and Ph.D. students.

What you will do:

• You will support the development of representation learning models to integrate massive-scale hierarchical data with diverse record sets.

• You will evaluate and benchmark diverse machine learning models to resolve data conflicts and improve the accuracy of relationship discovery at scale.

• You will assist in building scalable ML prototypes that analyze billions of data points to provide automated insights and personalization.

• You will develop efficient data pipelines to process and vectorize massive-scale datasets for downstream research and modeling tasks.

• You will collaborate closely with senior researchers to document findings and prepare technical reports on model performance and scalability.

Who you are:

• Currently enrolled in a Graduate program (Ph.D. preferred, or MS) in Computer Science, Data Science, or a related quantitative field.

• Solid understanding of Representation Learning, Embedding models, or Large-scale Data Modeling.

• Proficient in Python and modern ML frameworks such as PyTorch or TensorFlow; familiarity with Vector Databases or Large Language Models (LLMs) is a plus.

• Strong analytical skills with the ability to extract meaningful insights from massive-scale, complex datasets.

• A collaborative spirit and a desire to see research translated into real-world applications.

Additional Information:

Ancestry is an Equal Opportunity Employer that makes employment decisions without regard to race, color, religious creed, national origin, ancestry, sex, pregnancy, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, gender expression, age, mental or physical disability, medical condition, military or veteran status, citizenship, marital status, genetic information, or any other characteristic protected by applicable law. In addition, Ancestry will provide reasonable accommodations for qualified individuals with disabilities.

All job offers are contingent on a background check screen that complies with applicable law. For candidates who live in San Francisco, CA, pursuant to the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance, Ancestry will consider for employment qualified applicants with arrest and conviction records.

Ancestry is not accepting unsolicited assistance from search firms for this employment opportunity. All resumes submitted by search firms to any employee at Ancestry via-email, the Internet or in any form and/or method without a valid written search agreement in place for this position will be deemed the sole property of Ancestry. No fee will be paid in the event the candidate is hired by Ancestry as a result of the referral or through other means.