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Research Associate, Protein Purification & Characterization
Ginkgo BioworksUnited Statesfull_timeVerifiedPosted 10 Feb 2023
About the role
Our mission is to make biology easier to engineer. Ginkgo is constructing, editing, and redesigning the living world in order to answer the globe’s growing challenges in health, energy, food, materials, and more. Our bioengineers make use of an in-house automated foundry for designing and building new organisms. Today, our foundry is developing over 40 different organisms to make different products across multiple industries.
Whether they are the final product, catalysts for an engineered process, or a therapeutic to treat diseases - proteins lie at the center of many strain engineering efforts. The Protein Purification and Characterization (PPC) team operates at the intersection of Protein Engineering, High-throughput Screening, Fermentation, and Downstream Processing to help purify and assess the proteins and other biomacromolecules that are central to the mission at Ginkgo. We utilize the latest software and automation to develop low, mid, and high throughput methods for protein/RNA purification, enzyme kinetics and biophysical characterization.
As a Research Associate, you will have the opportunity to use your protein purification and biochemistry expertise at a growing company in a state-of-the-art facility. Your work at Ginkgo will require the purification of heterologous proteins from diverse sources, including microbial and mammalian expression systems. The proteins you will work on run the gamut - including biosynthetic enzymes, molecular biology reagents, food proteins, therapeutic proteins, protein nanoparticles and more. On top of purification of biomacromolecules (proteins, enzymes, AAVs, VLPs, RNA), your work will also include developing low, mid, and high-throughput characterization methods. Ginkgo is particularly interested in translating traditional biochemical and biophysical techniques into higher throughput methods using an array of technologies available at Ginkgo and on the market. One the goal of the PPC Team is to establish scalable platforms for protein/RNA purification, enzyme characterization, and biophysical protein characterization. #LI-LS1
Whether they are the final product, catalysts for an engineered process, or a therapeutic to treat diseases - proteins lie at the center of many strain engineering efforts. The Protein Purification and Characterization (PPC) team operates at the intersection of Protein Engineering, High-throughput Screening, Fermentation, and Downstream Processing to help purify and assess the proteins and other biomacromolecules that are central to the mission at Ginkgo. We utilize the latest software and automation to develop low, mid, and high throughput methods for protein/RNA purification, enzyme kinetics and biophysical characterization.
As a Research Associate, you will have the opportunity to use your protein purification and biochemistry expertise at a growing company in a state-of-the-art facility. Your work at Ginkgo will require the purification of heterologous proteins from diverse sources, including microbial and mammalian expression systems. The proteins you will work on run the gamut - including biosynthetic enzymes, molecular biology reagents, food proteins, therapeutic proteins, protein nanoparticles and more. On top of purification of biomacromolecules (proteins, enzymes, AAVs, VLPs, RNA), your work will also include developing low, mid, and high-throughput characterization methods. Ginkgo is particularly interested in translating traditional biochemical and biophysical techniques into higher throughput methods using an array of technologies available at Ginkgo and on the market. One the goal of the PPC Team is to establish scalable platforms for protein/RNA purification, enzyme characterization, and biophysical protein characterization. #LI-LS1
Responsibilities
- Purify enzyme and non-enzyme proteins, protein nanoparticles (AAVs, VLPs), and therapeutic nucleic acids (mRNA, circRNA) at small to medium scales to support strain engineering efforts at Ginkgo
- Develop protein/RNA/VLP purification methods at low, medium, and high throughput scale.
- Develop diverse methods for continuous and discontinuous (quench-based) kinetics assays
- Translate kinetics and biophysical assays from traditional benchtop set ups to automated liquid handlers to develop higher throughput methodologies
- Perform electrophoresis, light-scattering, etc. to assess protein purity and biophysical characterization
- Write Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) and maintain a high-quality Electronic Laboratory Notebook (ELN)
- Prepare presentations and present data to internal and external Ginkgo partners
- Work with teams with diverse scientific backgrounds and varying biochemistry experience levels
Minimum Qualifications
- Bachelor’s degree (with 0 to 3 years of experience) or Master’s degree (0 to 1 year of experience) or equivalent in molecular biology, biochemistry, bioengineering, chemical engineering, biophysics, or related field.
- Understanding of molecular biology, recombinant protein expression and construct design for protein chromatography methods; familiarity with standard expression hosts such as mammalian, microbial, and yeast is a plus.
- Hands-on experience with protein and nucleic acid purification (affinity, IEX, MMC, HIC, SEC, etc.). Experience with AKTA FPLCs and method optimization is a plus.
- Hands on experience in biochemistry techniques such as protein expression, gel electrophoresis, protein quantification assays, and enzyme kinetics
- Interest in high-throughput methods for protein purification and characterization
- Enthusiasm to learn new techniques and strong curiosity of areas of biology previously unknown to you
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