Research Associate (RL Environments)

Anthrogen•San Francisco, CA

5d•Onsite

About The Position

Anthrogen is developing AI systems to design modular biological machines and building experimental infrastructure, including a robotic lab, to bring those designs to life. The Research Associate will run molecular biology protocols on robotic platforms and generate demonstration data used to train policies for autonomous experimentation. The role combines expert wet-lab science with teaching robots to perform laboratory procedures. The position is onsite in San Francisco.

Requirements

Hands-on molecular biology experience, with a BS or MS in a life science or equivalent bench experience.
Meticulous approach, reproducible work, and excellent laboratory technique.
Strong gaming skills, including fast and precise hand-eye coordination, comfort with controllers and complex interfaces, and strong spatial reasoning.
Comfort with ambiguity and the pace of an early-stage lab.
Enthusiasm for automating parts of laboratory work to focus on tasks that require human judgment.

Nice To Haves

Experience with lab automation or liquid handlers such as Opentrons, Hamilton, or Tecan.
Robotics, teleoperation, or hardware tinkering experience.
Some Python or scripting experience.
A competitive or high-skill gaming background, such as speedrunning, fighting games, sim racing, or FPS.

Responsibilities

Execute molecular biology protocols, including cloning, transformations, PCR, protein expression and purification, and assay development, with a high standard of reproducibility.
Operate and teleoperate robotic systems to perform protocols and produce high-quality demonstration data.
Work with machine learning and robotics teams to identify failure modes, improve data quality, and expand the library of protocols robots can learn.
Help redesign bench workflows so they translate effectively to automation.
Take on increasing ownership as the autonomous lab scales.