Protein Engineer - Biosensors

Merge Labs • San Francisco, CA

13h

About The Position

Merge Labs is a frontier research lab working to bridge biological and artificial intelligence to maximize human ability, agency, and experience. It is developing new approaches to brain-computer interfaces that interact with the brain at high bandwidth, integrate with advanced AI, and are intended to be safe and accessible.

The Bio team designs, builds, and characterizes the biotechnologies that underpin next-generation brain-computer interfaces. It combines molecular engineering, synthetic biology, neuroscience, and physical methods such as ultrasound to establish less-invasive, high-bandwidth connections with neurons. The team develops core molecular technologies, validates performance in vitro and in vivo, demonstrates capabilities in animal models, builds custom experimental setups and pipelines, and collaborates across disciplines.

As a Protein Engineer - Biosensors, you will design, build, and optimize proteins that translate neuronal activity at the molecular scale into interpretable imaging signals. You will work with unconventional proteins, including multi-component assemblies, using biophysical insights, high-throughput experimental methods, and collaboration with the computational team. Your work will establish the molecular foundation for next-generation brain-computer interfaces.

Requirements

• PhD in Bioengineering, Biophysics, Biochemistry, or a related field, or equivalent experience leading research projects end-to-end.
• Experience working on biosensors or other proteins with novel functionality.
• Proficiency in library construction, protein expression in mammalian cells, and standard characterization.
• Comfort using computational approaches for protein engineering and understanding of the fundamental principles involved.
• Mechanistic thinking and strong biophysical intuition, with motivation to understand how systems work.
• Enjoyment of collaboration and ability to communicate naturally with experts across disciplines.
• Energy for 0-to-1 innovation and seeking creative ways to improve work.
• Interest in working on frontier scientific and technical problems in a fast-paced team.

Nice To Haves

• Experience engineering multi-state proteins and/or multi-component protein assemblies.
• Experience expressing proteins in primary neurons, brain organoids, or brain tissues.
• Physical thinking gained through ultrasound, optical, photophysical, or photochemical projects.
• Experience with large-scale screening.
• Experience with creative assay development.
• Familiarity with machine learning or data-driven design approaches.

Responsibilities

• Design and implement biosensor engineering strategies, including rational and computational design, directed evolution, and combinatorial libraries.
• Build and characterize protein variants at high throughput to test and iterate on hypotheses.
• Implement and optimize scalable workflows covering library generation, expression in in vitro systems such as mammalian cell lines, and standard and custom assays.
• Collaborate with the machine learning team to establish models linking sequences and structures to function, guide future construct generation, and augment scientific intuition.
• Investigate mechanisms behind complex biomolecules and use that understanding to develop creative designs, collaborating with biochemists, structural biologists, and computational teams.
• Develop novel screening and validation methods to accelerate the design-build-iterate cycle and support transition toward in vivo applications.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Education Level: Ph.D. or professional degree