R&D Scientist

Merck•Carlsbad, CA

11h•Onsite

About The Position

Work Your Magic with us! Start your next chapter and join EMD Electronics. Ready to explore, break barriers, and discover more? We know you’ve got big plans – so do we! Our colleagues across the globe love innovating with science and technology to enrich people’s lives with our solutions in Healthcare, Life Science, and Electronics. Together, we dream big and are passionate about caring for our rich mix of people, customers, patients, and planet. That's why we are always looking for curious minds that see themselves imagining the unimaginable with us. Everything we do in EMD Electronics is to help us deliver on our purpose of being the company behind the companies, advancing digital living. We are dedicated to being the trusted supplier of high-tech materials, services and specialty chemicals for the electronics, automotive and cosmetics industries. We foster a global collaborative organization made up of individuals who have the passion to win, obsess about the customer, are relentlessly curious and act with urgency. Together, we push the boundaries of science to make more possible for our customers. This role does not offer sponsorship for work authorization. External applicants must be eligible to work in the US.

Requirements

Master’s Degree in Chemistry, Materials Science, or related science discipline.
Industrial or academic experience in silicon, organosilicon, or organometallic chemistry.
2+ years of hands‑on laboratory experience in multistep synthesis

Nice To Haves

PhD in Chemistry, Materials Science, or related science discipline.
Strong teamwork and stakeholder management, ability to work in highly diverse and agile environment
Curiosity and drive to learn and translate academic skills into industrial practice
Deep understanding of synthetic organic chemistry (mechanisms, functional group transformations) and organosilicon chemistry fundamentals
Hands ‑ on experience with air/moisture ‑ sensitive chemistry: Schlenk techniques & glovebox use
Ability to plan experiments, maintain accurate lab notebooks, and interpret analytical data (1H/13C/29Si NMR, GC-TCD/FID, GC-MS)
Strong practical skills in purification (distillation, crystallization) and medium ‑ scale isolation
Familiarity with basic process ‑ safety principles (hazard identification, risk assessments) and safe handling of silanes and pyrophoric reagents.
Good data analysis and presentation skills
Clear written and verbal communication in English; ability to write experimental sections and internal reports

Responsibilities

Plan and execute synthesis of organosilane/silicon-containing molecules at mg–kg scales, including setup, monitoring, and workup.
Develop and optimize routes for yield, selectivity, scalability, cost, and impurity profiles; propose alternatives.
Design and interpret experiments (DoE as appropriate) experiments and perform reproducible scale-up runs.
Prepare, purify, and characterize compounds (NMR, GC/GC-MS, TGA/DSC as needed) and analyze impurities.
Maintain thorough experimental records; produce lab reports, batch records, and SOPs for technology transfer.
Support patent drafting with experimental examples, claim review, and enabling data suggestions.
Collaborate with analytical, EH&S, engineering, and applications/OEM teams to resolve issues.
Respond to customer/OEM synthesis requests and support samples for applications testing.