Senior Scientist – Protein Design

AstraZeneca•Seattle, WA

1d•Onsite

About The Position

AstraZeneca is seeking a Senior Scientist to join its Early Infectious Disease Unit in Seattle, Washington. The team discovers and develops vaccines and biologics targeting viral pathogens, drawing on expertise in virology, bacteriology, immunology, and vaccines. The successful candidate will apply computational protein design throughout drug discovery to advance next-generation vaccines and therapeutics, creating novel proteins and collaborating across disciplines to move projects forward. The role involves designing protein antigens, immunogens, binders, and antibodies; developing and maintaining computational pipelines; and integrating structural biology, sequence datasets, and scientific literature into design hypotheses. The scientist will evaluate emerging methods, analyze computational and experimental results, refine models and experiments, and help translate designs into testable constructs. The position also contributes to technical documentation, intellectual property, compute-resource optimization, project coordination, and publication of discoveries.

Requirements

Bachelor’s degree in Computational Biology, Bioengineering, Computer Science, Biophysics, Structural Biology, or a related scientific discipline and 4 or more years of experience; or a master’s degree in one of these fields and 2 or more years of experience; or a Ph.D. in one of these fields.
Broad experience in machine learning, structural biology, and/or biochemistry techniques.
Current hands-on experience with state-of-the-art computational protein design methods.
Proficiency with deep learning models and agentic workflows for proteins, such as protein language models, diffusion or generative models, and supervised learning for property prediction.
Hands-on experience with structure prediction and design methods such as AlphaFold/ColabFold, Rosetta, ProteinMPNN, or RFdiffusion, as well as docking and enhanced sampling.
Extensive hands-on experience designing, engineering, producing, and characterizing protein antigens and/or other complex proteins.
Extensive knowledge of protein structure and structural biology, including model building, analysis, and structure determination techniques such as X-ray crystallography and cryo-EM.
Experience with protein biochemistry techniques, including mammalian or bacterial recombinant protein expression and protein purification, and characterization methods such as UV-Vis spectroscopy, fluorescence spectroscopy, SEC-MALS, and nanoDSF.
Experience with molecular biology techniques such as gene synthesis, PCR, and cloning.
Strong Python or similar programming experience, software engineering practices (version control, testing, and code review), scientific computing, data management, and shared compute-resource usage.
Strong interpersonal and collaborative skills, with evidence of supporting problem solving and delivery in a team-oriented environment.
Ability to work collaboratively in a fast-paced environment while planning and meeting timelines.
Demonstrated research success and experience preparing written scientific reports, such as manuscripts, and oral presentations, such as slides or posters.
Ability to multitask and prioritize multiple projects.
Strong verbal and written communication skills.
Ability to understand, conduct, and interpret technically challenging experiments with minimal supervision.

Nice To Haves

Experience training novel models for protein design and/or modeling.
Experience drafting patents for protein-based inventions.

Responsibilities

Design and generate novel protein antigens, immunogens, binders, and antibodies through computational experiments for prophylactic immunity or therapeutic benefit against relevant pathogens.
Develop, validate, and maintain computational pipelines using protein structure software, including agentic workflows, deep learning, generative models, structure prediction, docking, and molecular simulation.
Contribute concepts and methods in antigen design, protein nanoparticle scaffolding, multivalent display, epitope focusing, and emerging vaccine technologies.
Use structural biology, large-scale sequence datasets, and literature to guide design hypotheses and conduct in silico experiments.
Collaborate across the organization to translate computational designs into testable constructs and drive projects to completion.
Make detailed observations, perform quantitative analyses, interpret results independently, and propose follow-up experiments or model refinements based on computational and in vitro readouts.
Scout, evaluate, and integrate algorithms, tools, and frameworks such as protein language models, diffusion models, and active learning to improve design success and reduce cycle time.
Prepare technical summaries, protocols, quantitative analyses, and appropriate documentation.
Contribute to intellectual property by drafting invention disclosures and working with legal teams on patents related to computational design methods and novel constructs.
Optimize compute-resource use.
Oversee day-to-day organization of project-related components.
Publish discoveries in high-quality, peer-reviewed journals.