Senior Scientist Bioscience Immunology, Early Respiratory and Immunology

AstraZeneca is a global, science-driven biopharmaceutical company. We are dedicated to discovering, developing, and delivering innovative, meaningful medicines and healthcare solutions that enrich the lives of patients. The vision of AstraZeneca Early Respiratory & Immunology (Early R&I) is centered on delivering life-changing products that advance world health and help fight and cure disease. Early R&I is one of three main therapeutic research areas within AstraZeneca that deliver candidate drugs into late-stage clinical development. Here, you’ll have the opportunity to make a difference in people’s lives every day.

As a part of building Immunology Bioscience team within Early R&I department, we are seeking a highly motivated senior researcher with a strong understanding of adaptive and/or innate immunity and ideally understanding key biological pathways in immune-mediated diseases such as rheumatological and/or gastrointestinal diseases. The role will be based in Gaithersburg (US) or Waltham, MA (Boston BioHub) within AstraZeneca’s state-of-the-art laboratories where you will follow the science to help drive innovation and advance medicine to help improve patient lives.

In this role, you would be expected to demonstrate an exceptionally high level of enthusiasm for innovative scientific research leading to the discovery and development of novel therapeutics. Ideally, you have expertise in Myeloid cells, T-, B- and innate immunity and/or pathogenic mechanisms involved in tissue pathology in immune-mediated diseases. Experience in complex co-culture systems and cell imaging, and an ability to apply this experience to an understanding of the basic mechanisms of human immune-mediated disease is preferred.

Main Duties and Responsibilities

Immunology team focusing on developing therapeutics for treatment of Rheumatological and Gastrointestinal Diseases. This position requires a strong interest in bench with the ability to train junior scientists and you will have significant opportunity to drive the direction of the work. The work will be predominantly human in vitro systems, working with primary and disease tissue-derived cells, although knowledge and experience of in vivo science is a bonus. A background in human immunology and immune-mediated diseases and translational approaches to understand basic biological mechanisms in disease is needed.

• You will focus your research on characterizing novel immunological pathways in health and disease to aid target validation and drug projects

• You will contribute and drive strategies for new target identification for the treatment of immune-mediated diseases such as rheumatological and gastrointestinal disease

• You will collaborate with scientists from a variety of functional teams in Waltham along with our sites in Gaithersburg, MD; Cambridge, UK and Gothenburg, Sweden.

• You will benefit from daily interaction and collaboration with highly accomplished scientists and the position offers a unique opportunity to work in a dynamic and innovative environment developing your career at the interface of research and drug discovery.

• You will be involved in the development of new assays and implementing novel technical advances.

• You will utilize human tissue cultures to profile and understand the mechanism of action of therapeutics

• Publication of your work in high impact journals.

Requirements

• Ph.D. in Immunology, or a closely related field with 3-5 years’ experience required (post-doctoral experience preferred).

• Deep knowledge of adaptive and/or innate immune cell biology is critical, preferentially with strong hands-on experience with myeloid, T, B and stromal cells.

• Experience working in the pharma/biotech is strongly preferred.

• Expertise in drug discovery projects in the immunology, fibrotic diseases or a closely related field of biology is preferred.

• Highly organized and self-motivated, with the ability to work independently as well as collaboratively within a team to conduct a high-level research project.

• Strong hands-on skills in cell biology assays, basic biochemical and molecular techniques.

• Expertise in primary human and mouse cell culture including co-culture models, expertise in multi-parametric FACS, multiplex cytokine detection and functional assays (proliferation, cytotoxicity etc..).

• Strong written and oral communication skills and the ability to critically analyze data sets.

• Demonstrated ability to run collaborative efforts and utilize external resources to find the most effective solutions to drug discovery problems.

• Ability to record protocols and experiments in t