Scientist, Assay & Automation Development
About The Position
Plasmidsaurus is seeking a scientist to combine experimental expertise with robotics and emerging AI tools to develop new ways of performing biology experiments and expand scientific capabilities. The role focuses on creating methods that enable scientists to explore more questions, test more hypotheses, and generate knowledge at greater speed and scale. The successful candidate will work across scientific disciplines, develop methods not yet established in the company’s labs, and rapidly take ideas from concept to functioning systems. The position involves developing and validating experimental methods, including capabilities such as protein expression and purification and high-throughput molecular biology techniques. The scientist will lead research projects from hypothesis and experimental design through execution, analysis, and iteration; use computational tools and LLMs to support experimental work; and work with scientists and engineers to integrate new capabilities into automated systems. A major focus is translating manual wet-lab protocols into reliable robotic workflows and supporting the research team’s adoption of automation. Success is expected to include delivering a new robotics-accelerated capability within 30 days, independently leading an end-to-end robotics-accelerated research project and establishing reliable automated workflows within three months, and expanding the robot fleet’s capabilities while replacing manual protocols and building reusable methods within six months.
Requirements
- PhD in molecular biology, biochemistry, bioengineering, or a closely related wet-lab discipline.
- Strong hands-on experience in molecular biology techniques, including PCR, cell culture, and sequencing.
- Experience developing, troubleshooting, and optimizing biological workflows.
- Practical expertise in protein expression.
- Experience with high-throughput display technologies, such as ribosome, mRNA, cDNA, or phage display.
- Hands-on experience scaling workflows and improving throughput, reliability, and reproducibility through robotics.
- Experience using LLMs and computational tools in scientific work.
- Data analysis skills to evaluate experimental results and guide decisions.
- A track record of developing, adapting, or implementing new methods to solve challenging research problems.
Responsibilities
- Design, develop, and validate experimental methods that expand the range and complexity of scientific questions the team can investigate.
- Establish capabilities such as protein expression and purification, ribosome display, mRNA display, cDNA display, and other high-throughput molecular biology techniques.
- Adapt methods across disciplines and develop new approaches when established protocols are insufficient.
- Lead research projects from hypothesis and experimental design through execution, data analysis, and iteration.
- Use data, computational tools, and LLMs to accelerate experimental design, troubleshooting, and analysis.
- Collaborate with scientists and engineers to integrate new capabilities into increasingly sophisticated automated systems.
- Translate complex manual wet-lab protocols into reliable, reproducible robotic workflows.
- Build and optimize experiments for liquid handling robots, identifying and removing barriers to automation.
- Support the research team in adopting automated protocols.
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What This Job Offers
Job Type
Full-time
Career Level
Senior
Education Level
Ph.D. or professional degree
