Personalized TCR-T Team Lead

Title: Personalized TCR-T Team Lead  

Location: Upper East Side  

Org Unit: MCC Laboratories 

Work Days:  

Weekly Hours: 35.00 

Exemption Status: Exempt

Salary Range: $165,700.00 - $188,000.00  

*As required under NYC Human Rights Law Int 1208-2018 - Salary range for this role when Hired for NYC Offices 

Position Summary

Responsible for establishing and driving a cutting-edge research group and platform for personalized TCR‑based cell therapies targeting autologous tumors. The mission of this team is to build a rigorous, high‑throughput discovery and preclinical development engine that identifies high throughput and with high confidence tumor-specific TCRs for downstream analysis, engineering, and translational development. The Lead integrates immunologic insight, genomic analysis, and clinical collaboration to advance personalized TCR gene therapy for patients.

Job Responsibilities

• Design and implement an end-to-end personalized TCR discovery workflow including tumor-reactive T cell identification, TCR cloning, specificity validation, and safety de-risking leading to the selection of personalized TCRs for clinical application
• Develop platform of experimental massive parallel screening of T cells for recognition of autologous tumor cell lines or tumor antigen-expressing APCs; purification and analysis of tumor-reactive T cells.
• Develop workflow for human T cell isolation, scRNA/TCRseq and computational inference of tumor-reactive T cells. Understand deeply relevant computational methods and work closely with computational experts.
• Establish platform for massive parallel TCR cloning and screening; deep TCR characterization including affinity, avidity and functionality in a cellular context.
• Directly analyze and interpret complex patient-based campaigns for identification of TCRs. Integrate data across functional potency, specificity, and safety to support go/no-go decisions on specific TCRs.
• Establish and optimize advanced de-risking methods and workflows to assess alloreactivity, unintended HLA interactions, off-target toxicity risk including X-scan, peptide library screens and library-on-library HTS.
• Develop a platform of cell-based systems and in vitro surrogates of normal tissues to assess TCR risk.
• Contribute to translational packages (reports, assay descriptions, validation summaries) supporting IND/CTA‑enabling preclinical data.
• Collaborate with cross functional teams to integrate learnings and advance gene therapy initiatives.

Education

• Master’s Degree or Ph.D. in an appropriate field. Equivalent work experience will be considered.

Experience

A minimum of 10 years of post-PhD experience in TCR discovery, ideally applied to cell therapy development.

Approximately 3 years or related experience in GLP/GMP or Pharmaceutical environments.

Experience in working closely with computational teams, interpreting high‑dimensional datasets, and integrating quantitative outputs into experimental design.

Passion for bridging rigorous basic science with translational impact; resilient, innovative, and comfortable in a fast-paced, milestone-oriented environment.

Proven track record leading small-to-medium teams on complex, multi‑stakeholder translational projects or platform builds, ideally in a translational or biotech‑like setting, with demonstrated ability to advance candidates from discovery to preclinical validation.

 

Knowledge, Skills and Abilities

• Deep technical expertise in high-throughput TCR screening, single cell technologies and TCR repertoire analysis, TCR cloning/expression, functional validation, and safety de-risking.
• Ability to build scalable and reproduceable identification pipelines for personalized TCR therapy programs.
• Familiarity with institutional and federal regulatory documentation and compliance standards.
• Excellent communication skills in English, with the ability to interact effectively with clinicians, basic scientists, and operational stakeholders.
• Effective communication skills to translate complex discovery findings into actionable development decisions.

Licenses and Certifications

Working Conditions/Physical Demands

Ability to work flexible hours, evenings and weekends, when requested for special projects.

 

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