Senior Laboratory Research Scientist (Senior Protein Biochemist)

We are looking for an experienced and hands-on Senior Protein Biochemist to build and develop the protein production pipeline at the heart of this programme. 

You’ll design constructs, express and purify proteins and complexes, develop scalable screening workflows and deliver cryo-EM-ready samples, working closely with structural biologists, computational scientists and engineers.

A key focus will be scale and automation. You’ll develop workflows that can move from small-scale screening to preparative production and help progressively transfer them onto automated liquid-handling platforms.

This is an exciting opportunity to apply your protein biochemistry expertise at the intersection of structural biology, automation and AI-enabled drug discovery.

Key Responsibilities 

These include but are not limited to:

• Designing, cloning, expressing and purifying proteins and protein complexes.
• Developing scalable protein production and purification workflows.
• Delivering high-quality, cryo-EM-ready samples.
• Performing protein quality control, binding and activity assays.
• Designing workflows with automation, sample tracking and scalability in mind.
• Supporting the implementation of automated liquid-handling and purification technologies.
• Working collaboratively with structural biologists, computational scientists and engineers.
• Contributing to publications, presentations and patents.

About you

You will have:  

• PhD in biochemistry, structural biology or a related discipline or equivalent experience.
• Strong hands-on experience in protein expression and purification, including proteins or protein complexes.
• Experience producing proteins for structural studies, ideally including cryo-EM.
• Experience with protein quality control and in vitro binding or activity assays.
• Experience developing workflows that scale from screening to preparative production.
• Strong organisational, problem-solving and communication skills.
• A collaborative, innovative and self-motivated approach.

About us

The Francis Crick Institute is a biomedical discovery institute dedicated to understanding the fundamental biology underlying health and disease. Its work is helping to understand why disease develops and to translate discoveries into new ways to prevent, diagnose and treat illnesses such as cancer, heart disease, stroke, infections, and neurodegenerative diseases.

An independent organisation, its founding partners are the Medical Research Council, Cancer Research UK, Wellcome, UCL, Imperial College London and King’s College London.

The Crick was formed in 2015, and in 2016 it moved into a new state-of-the-art building in central London which brings together 1500 scientists and support staff working collaboratively across disciplines, making it the biggest biomedical research facility under one building in Europe.

The Francis Crick Institute will be world-class with a strong national role. Its distinctive vision for excellence includes commitments to collaboration; developing emerging talent and exporting it to the rest of the UK; public engagement; and helping turn discoveries into treatments as quickly as possible to improve lives and strengthen the economy. 

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