JOB DESCRIPTION
Role: 2 Positions Protein Scientist/ Senior Protein Scientist
Location: Stevenage
Reports to: Chief Scientific Officer
Duration: Permanent
Hours:
Full Time
General Purpose and Scope
Avacta Life Sciences are developing Affimers as an antibody mimetic platform. Affimers are a novel
protein scaffold based on the human protease inhibitor Stefin A. We aim to establish Affimers as a
therapeutic scaffold to support the growing demand for the next generation of biotherapeutics that
will be superior to the current market leader, monoclonal antibodies. We have recently raised £22M
for the therapeutic development of Affimers and signed a significant deal with Moderna Therapeutics.
We are currently based at the Stevenage Biosciences Catalyst and are actively looking to expand the
team to support the development of our own proprietary Affimer based product pipeline focussing on
oncology and inflammatory diseases.
We require a highly motivated Protein Scientist who has had previous experience of working on
protein scaffold/antibody technologies in either the biotech/pharma sector. Your role will be to
express and biophysically characterise Affimers generated by phage display, identify leads with good
drug development properties, engineer leads with half-life extension technologies and produce high
quality material for pre-clinical studies.
Main Duties and Responsibilities
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Clone , express and purify lead Affimers for protein characterisation work, binding studies and
stability testing
Clone, express, purify and characterise recombinant proteins to be used in phage screens,
ELISA/cell based assays from a range of expression platforms
Engineer Affimers with serum half- life extension technologies (e.g. as Fc-fusions)
Carry out optimisation studies to increase Affimer production from microbial hosts
Develop bench scale protein purification protocols using conventional chromatography resins to
purify gram quantities of Affimer
Set up and carry out HPLC based assays to characterise Affimers (e.g. size exclusion, reverse
phase chromatography etc.)
Carry out accelerated stability studies on Affimers and characterise changes that may occur
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Clone, express and purify recombinant proteins using a range of expression systems including
CHO/HEK and fully characterise them using a range of methods
Produce high quality Affimer and tool molecules for pre-clinical studies
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Present work/data to clients and writing scientific reports
Maintaining a current and accurate laboratory record (lab notebook) of all activities
This job description is not exhaustive and you may be required to undertake other duties that are in
line with the above responsibilities.
SF0018 (Ver01)
JOB DESCRIPTION
Essential skills and previous experience
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A BSc/PhD in protein biochemistry, protein engineering or molecular biology with a minimum of
2-4 years’ laboratory experience of working with therapeutic protein scaffolds and antibodies
Standard DNA manipulation/cloning techniques and protein engineering including working with a
range of protein expression platforms (bacterial, Pichia and mammalian)
Mammalian cell culture, transfections, culturing and maintaining cells for protein production
Large scale protein production experience would be an advantage
Practical knowledge of the AKTA purification platform and Unicorn software and using
conventional chromatography resins e.g. ion exchange
Developing HPLC based assays for protein characterisation
Excellent knowledge of a range of methodologies to characterise proteins (e.g. Biacore, ELISA,
Western blot)
A good understanding of protein engineering and protein biophysics to investigate
structure/functional relationships would be an advantage.
Knowledge or experience of protein NMR and crystallography would also be an advantage.
Organised with an ability to work well under pressure and to challenging timelines
Benefits
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Pension Scheme: up to 5% matching contributions
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Eye Care Scheme
Childcare Voucher Scheme
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Performance Related Share Option Scheme
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25 days holiday in addition to bank holidays
To apply for this position please forward your CV with a covering letter to HR@avacta.com
SF0018 (Ver01)