Postdoctoral Associate

Posting Description

POSTDOCTORAL ASSOCIATE, Center for Biomedical Innovation, supports an ARPA-H program developing a platform for continuous manufacturing of extracellular vehicles (EVs). EVs are lipid bilayer-enclosed particles released by most cell types that mediate cellular communication by delivering cargoes including proteins, nucleic acids, lipids, and metabolites. EVs have potential as a therapeutic modality due to cargo capacity, low immunogenicity, and tissue-specific targeting. The United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) requires that manufacturers demonstrate that every drug lot is free of adventitious agents (AAs) such as bacterial and fungal contaminants. Current AA detection methods require lengthy culture times and are not suitable for continuous manufacturing, where rapid at-line tools are required. CBI has developed approaches to AA detection suitable for continuous manufacturing and potentially applicable in the biopharmaceutical industry. Will design and execute experiments to address this challenge.

Job Requirements

REQUIRED: Ph.D. and a minimum of two years of experience in Biochemical or Chemical Engineering, Biological Sciences, or a closely related field; experience performing metabolic analysis using mass spectrometry, especially in complex matrices; experience with metabolomic pathway bioinformatics analysis and development of rapid point-of-use analytical tools; demonstrated experience in standard techniques and analytics for mammalian cell culture and microbial cell culture; experience with modern molecular biology techniques such as PCR (qPCR, ddPCR, dPCR), ELISA, Western blotting; ability to work both independently and collaboratively as part of a team; and a record of effectively prioritizing multiple responsibilities, troubleshooting technical issues, and developing & executing detailed technical protocols. PREFERRED: Familiarity with bacterial and fungal biology; and strong professional communication and documentation skills such as internal communications, external publications, scientific presentations, and various forms of recordkeeping.