Senior Scientist In Protein Science

About us The Faculty of Life Sciences is an exciting and dynamic environment driving forward ambitious and challenging plans for future development. We are committed to enhancing research and teaching in relation to major global challenges, including climate change, sustainability, technological change and the data revolution and inequality. Ranked No. 1 in London and No. 8 in the world (QS World University Rankings 2021). The Faculty offers an outstanding and diverse portfolio of Undergraduate and Postgraduate programmes in biological and biomedical sciences, pharmacy, pharmacological and pharmaceutical sciences, neuroscience and machine learning. The Faculty is made up of five academic Divisions; the School of Pharmacy, Biosciences, the Laboratory for Molecular Cell Biology, the Sainsbury Wellcome Centre for Neurocircuits and Behaviour and the Gatsby Computational Neuroscience Unit. In addition, it is home to a specialist teaching facility; the Cruciform Teaching Facilities Unit. Some of the constituent parts of the Faculty have long and distinguished histories that can be traced back to the early 19th century when UCL was founded and we are proud to have nine Nobel Laureates associated with Life Sciences. UCL School of Pharmacy is one of the world’s leading centres of excellence for pharmaceutical science, education and professional engagement. The Division has a well-established track record in high quality research across a broad range of drug discovery, pharmacy and patient safety related areas as well as in the development of spinout companies bringing new therapeutic strategies to the patient. About the role This is an exciting opportunity to become a Senior Scientist at the UCL School of Pharmacy based within the Research Department of Pharmaceutical and Biological Chemistry. The role holder will provide a high level of technical support to staff in the School of Pharmacy in the production and purification of diverse protein samples. The role is in support of a collaboration between UCL and the Structural Genomics Consortium (SGC) that aims to kickstart a major research initiative in the area of machine learning applied to the discovery of new small molecule binders of under-studied proteins. The proteins generated, relevant to UCL projects, will be used in the benchmarking of machine learning algorithms through a comparison of predicted and measured binding, in order to improve our ability to predict novel protein binders de novo. This is an initiative run in partnership with other SGC sites (e.g., Toronto, Chapel Hill), the SGC’s extended pharma network and researchers in artificial intelligence. In alignment with the open research ethos of Professor Todd’s laboratory and the SGC, all data and ideas will be freely shared with the community. We are emphatically seeking collegiate individuals who will work well with others as part of a fast-moving team. To promote the maximum team and consortium momentum, the posts are all expected to be full-time on site. There is the potential for some of the clerical/administrative work to be done remotely where that is appropriate. About you We are seeking staff with extensive experience in the preparation and purification of samples of human proteins, using various expression systems (e.g., bacteria, mammalian and insect cell systems), purification techniques (e.g., IMAC, IEX, GF using ÄKTA systems) and characterisation methods (e.g., mass spectrometry, SPR, thermal stability, etc.). The ability to work quickly as part of a multi-disciplinary team is essential.