Principal Scientist, Protein Engineering Display Technologies

Working with Us
Challenging. Meaningful. Life-changing. Those aren’t words that are usually associated with a job. But working at Bristol Myers Squibb is anything but usual. Here, uniquely interesting work happens every day, in every department. From optimizing a production line to the latest breakthroughs in cell therapy, this is work that transforms the lives of patients, and the careers of those who do it. You’ll get the chance to grow and thrive through opportunities uncommon in scale and scope, alongside high-achieving teams rich in diversity. Take your career farther than you thought possible.

Bristol Myers Squibb recognizes the importance of balance and flexibility in our work environment. We offer a wide variety of competitive benefits, services and programs that provide our employees with the resources to pursue their goals, both at work and in their personal lives. Read more: careers.bms.com/working-with-us.

Position Summary

We are seeking an enthusiastic, creative, and versatile Principal Scientist to join our collaborative Protein Engineering team in Redwood City/Brisbane (CA) to discover and engineer innovative biotherapeutic candidates and drive technological innovation. Our group acts on new ideas in the laboratory and thrives on the design-build-test cycle. You will solve complex protein engineering problems and implement robust platforms for protein therapeutic optimization. You will collaborate with talented colleagues across biotherapeutics and multiple therapeutic areas, and further support AI/ML workflows. You will present at internal and external meetings, contribute to therapeutic pipeline projects, publications, and patents. Responsibilities include selection-based assays using protein display library technologies, binder engineering for antibody-target interaction, cross-function and cross-site collaboration, and project and team management.  

Responsibilities

• Lead yeast display team responsible for lead optimization of therapeutic proteins
• Manage protein engineering/lead optimization pipeline and supervise laboratory scientists
• Drive efforts to engineer antibodies, multispecifics, and alternative biologic formats for optimal therapeutic performance
• Perform selections on yeast display libraries
• Library design in collaboration with AI/ML engineers, library construction, NGS
• Independently perform routine molecular biology techniques, DNA assembly and cloning, design expression constructs for external synthesis, and coordinate construct and library orders with CROs
• Analyze library NGS data using no-code or low-code bioinformatics platforms
• Independently perform complex experiments, troubleshoot, expertly analyze and interpret experimental results with strong attention to detail and documentation practices
• Present results internally and externally, attend industry conferences
• Accomplish goals under project team timelines

Basic Qualifications

• Bachelor’s Degree with 9+ years of academic/industry experience, Master’s Degree with 7+ years of academic/industry experience or PhD in Biochemistry, Bioengineering, Molecular Biology, or related fields with 5+ years of academic/industry experience

Preferred Qualifications

• PhD in Biochemistry, Bioengineering, Molecular Biology, or related fields with 5+ years of relevant post-graduate or biotech/biopharma industry experience related to antibody design and engineering
• Expertise in molecular biology including DNA and RNA purification, cloning and DNA assembly, PCR, mutagenesis, plasmid/vector construction, vector elements, Sanger sequencing, NGS library preparation, etc.
• Demonstrated experience in yeast display, antibody/protein library construction, sorting, analytical binding, etc.
• Flow cytometry and FACS
• In-depth understanding and experience in antibody engineering, including, but not limited to, affinity maturation, deep mutational scanning, species cross-reactivity, liability correction, biophysical/physiochemical property remediation, etc.
• Sound understanding of proteins, antibodies, sequence, and structure-function relationships
• Familiarity with biotherapeutics developability and manufacturability
• Familiarity with protein structure analysis (Pymol, Chimera, MOE).
• Familiarity with protein-protein interaction techniques and kinetics (BLI, SPR, on-cell binding)
• Bioinformatics or data science experience is desirable (bash, Python, or R)
• Proficiency with Microsoft Office suite, FlowJo, Prism, DNA cloning software
• Managerial/supervisorial exp