Machine Learning Engineer Intern - Summer 2026
Machine Learning Engineer Intern - Summer 2026 at Novaflow — San Francisco, CA, US
- Company: Novaflow
- Location: San Francisco, CA, US
- Employment type: INTERN
- Salary: USD 6000–10000 / year
- Posted: 2026-07-17
About this role
About Novaflow
Novaflow is the AI data analyst for biology labs. Analytics is the bottleneck for scientific discovery. Biologists have to outsource analysis to expensive bioinformaticians or core services and wait weeks or months for results. We're solving this by putting analysis directly back into the hands of researchers, allowing them to go from raw data to publication-ready insights and visualizations in days instead of months. We're well-funded, growing extremely fast, and backed by leading investors including Y Combinator and BioRender.
About the Role
We're hiring a Machine Learning Engineer Intern to help build the AI systems that power our platform. The core challenge: take a natural language query from a biologist and turn it into a correct, reliable bioinformatics workflow. You'll work with LLMs, experiment with prompt engineering and fine-tuning, and help build evaluation systems to measure when the outputs are actually good.
This is not a sit-in-the-corner internship. We're a small team and you'll work directly with the founders on real problems from day one. We're looking for someone with high agency who takes initiative and doesn't wait to be told what to do. Biology background is not required.
This role can be remote or in-person at our San Francisco office. There is potential to convert to a full-time position based on performance.
What You'll Work On
Help build and improve LLM-powered pipelines that turn natural language into bioinformatics workflows
Assist with evaluation pipelines and benchmarks to measure model quality
Experiment with fine-tuning, RAG, prompt engineering, and different model architectures
Help deploy and scale models in production on AWS or GCP
Contribute to AI tooling and infrastructure decisions
Work across the team to integrate ML capabilities into the product
Requirements
Currently pursuing or recently completed a Bachelor's or Master's in Computer Science, Machine Learning, AI, or a related field
Strong Python skills
Familiarity with ML frameworks (PyTorch, TensorFlow, or similar)
Basic understanding of LLMs and modern AI techniques (fine-tuning, RAG, prompt engineering)
Some experience working with datasets and building data pipelines
Can think critically about when an LLM output is actually correct
Nice to Have
Hands-on experience building LLM-powered applications
Familiarity with Anthropic, OpenAI, or other LLM APIs
Experience with Docker and cloud platforms (AWS or GCP)
Exposure to scientific or biological data
Previous startup experience (prior experience either working for or founding a startup)
Why Join Us?
Competitive intern compensation
Meals covered when you're in the office (lunch daily, dinner when you're working late)
Opportunity to convert to a full-time founding team role
Work directly with the founders with full visibility into product strategy, customer conversations, and fundraising
Real responsibility from day one at a fast-growing YC company
If you're curious about being a founder one day, this is your front-row seat.