Scientist, cDNA Display

🏢 Manifoldbio · 📍 Boston 💰 $118,000 - $118,000 / yr
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Position Summary & Responsibilities

Manifold Bio is a platform biotechnology company pioneering AI-guided protein design and massively multiplexed in vivo screening to unlock tissue-targeted medicines and organism-scale models of living systems. Using proprietary molecular barcoding technology, we screen hundreds of thousands of protein designs simultaneously in living systems, producing in vivo-validated datasets at a scale no one else can match. The datasets power our computational models, which leads to better drug designs, creating a flywheel that gets stronger with every campaign. Our team of protein engineers, biologists, and computational scientists works across this full stack to pursue programs both internally and with leading pharma companies.

Position

Manifold Bio is seeking a scientist to build and own a high-throughput, automated cell-free display platform for screening computationally designed protein binder libraries against hundreds of therapeutic receptor targets. This platform will be a cornerstone of Manifold's closed-loop AI-driven molecule discovery engine, generating the large-scale, high-quality binding data needed to train and improve our design models. The ideal candidate is a hands-on scientist with deep expertise in cell-free display technologies and a drive to build automated systems that can operate at scale. You will work at the intersection of protein engineering, laboratory automation, and ML-guided drug discovery, collaborating closely with our binder discovery, ML, and automation teams.

Responsibilities

  • Design, develop, and validate a cell-free display platform (cDNA display or similar) compatible with diverse binder formats 
  • Work with automation team to scale and automate the platform to enable routine, high-throughput screening against large panels of therapeutic targets
  • Collaborate with ML and computational teams to ensure screening outputs feed effectively into model training pipelines
  • Work with the protein engineering team to support discovery campaigns and affinity maturation as platform capacity allows 
  • Stay current on advances in cell-free display, laboratory automation, and computational protein design

Required Qualifications

  • PhD or equivalent experience in protein bioche
🎯 Candidate Preparation Guide For Manifoldbio Applicants

Key Role Competencies & Evaluation Highlights

Key Role Focus:

Scientific rigor combined with high-velocity engineering is tested intensely; interviewers look for pioneers who can build multiplexed protein measurement platforms at scale.

📋 Preparation Priorities (Key Areas to Clarify):
  • 1. Working strictly in academic silos without an appreciation for commercial drug discovery timelines
  • 2. Inability to troubleshoot unexpected assay failures with data-driven pragmatism
  • 3. Resistance to cross-disciplinary collaboration between wet-lab scientists and computational teams
✨ Recommended Role Alignment Hook:

I build high-throughput protein measurement engines that accelerate therapeutic discovery by turning complex biological data into actionable insights.

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