Cartography Biosciences
Principal Scientist / Associate Director, Developability & Protein Sciences
- Compensation
- Not disclosed
- Location
- South San Francisco, CA
- Work setup
- Hybrid
- Seniority
- Principal
- Employment
- Not specified
- Experience
- 5+ years
- Category
- Not specified
- Posted
Skills
Must have
- PhD in protein science, biochemistry, biophysics, chemical or biological engineering, or a related discipline with 5+ years (Principal Scientist) or 8+ years (Associate Director) of biopharmaceutical
- Hands-on experience with bispecific or multispecific antibodies (e.g. knob-into-hole, common light chain, VHH / single-domain fusions), including analysis of product-related species.
- Hands-on expertise with biophysical and developability methods, such as DSF or DSC, analytical SEC, IEX, HIC, CE-SDS, intact mass, self-association assays (e.g. AC-SINS), and polyspecificity assays (e
- Developability triage experience in a research or discovery setting, translating biophysical data into candidate selection decisions.
- Experience with mammalian transient expression and multi-step antibody purification on FPLC systems (AKTA or equivalent), including Protein A capture and polishing by IEX, HIC, or mixed-mode chromatog
- Experience serving as the protein sciences or developability expert on cross-functional therapeutic project teams, including developability data you presented that shaped a candidate selection or adva
- Demonstrated ability to lead cross-functional teams without direct authority, including setting priorities, running team meetings, and driving decisions to closure.
- Experience managing or mentoring scientists.
- Hands-on experience writing code to analyze data or automate lab workflows (e.g. Python or R), including with AI coding assistants such as Claude Code.
Nice to have
- Experience leading or co-leading a cross-functional therapeutic program team, or serving as deputy to a program lead.
- Experience using in silico tools to predict antibody developability and biophysical properties.
- Experience with PTM characterization by peptide mapping LC-MS and with stress and forced degradation studies.
- Formulation development experience, particularly high-concentration (greater than 100 mg/mL) formulations for subcutaneous dosing.
- Experience with liquid-handling automation and high-throughput purification and characterization.
- Experience managing outsourced protein production or characterization.
- Knowledge of T-cell engaging antibody platforms and a background in oncology or immuno-oncology.
- Experience building data pipelines, analysis tools, or agentic workflows with AI coding tools.
Full description
About the Role
We are looking for a Principal Scientist or Associate Director to lead developability and protein sciences for our bispecific and multispecific antibody programs, including T-cell engagers. You will own the biophysical and developability screening that informs lead selection, along with the expression and purification that supplies it, working in house and with external partners. You will manage and grow a small team of scientists and play a leading role on cross-functional therapeutic program teams.
This is a hands-on, hybrid role based onsite in South San Francisco, with roughly half of your time at the bench alongside the team. You will turn developability data into program decisions and work with Antibody Engineering, Pharmacology, and program leadership to act on them. We expect the scope of the role to grow with the team and the pipeline.
Key Responsibilities
Developability & Biophysical Characterization
- Deliver developability and biophysical data for therapeutic programs as candidates advance from hit screening through lead optimization to development candidate nomination.
- Own the developability screening cascade, including thermal stability (e.g. DSF, DSC), aggregation (e.g. analytical SEC), self-association (e.g. AC-SINS, DLS), charge variants (e.g. IEX, cIEF), hydrophobicity (e.g. HIC), polyspecificity (e.g. BVP ELISA, PSR), and molecular integrity (e.g. intact mass, CE-SDS).
- Integrate in silico biophysical property assessment (e.g. sequence liabilities, surface patch analysis, aggregation propensity) with experimental data to prioritize and engineer candidates.
- Characterize advanced leads and development candidates in depth through stress and forced degradation studies, PTM mapping (e.g. peptide mapping LC-MS), and early formulation development.
- Help define and own the developability criteria at each program decision gate, and apply them consistently across programs.
- Expand the throughput, robustness, and technical scope of our protein analytics capabilities to support AI/ML-driven antibody engineering.
Protein Expression & Purification
- Oversee research-stage protein production from 1 mL to 10 L scale, in house and through external partners, run as a service with clear intake, prioritization, turnaround, and quality acceptance of incoming material.
- Optimize transient production of multi-chain bispecific and multispecific assemblies (knob-into-hole heterodimers, VHH-containing trispecifics), including plasmid chain-ratio tuning to maximize correctly assembled product.
- Direct purification strategies that resolve bispecific product-related species from the correctly paired heterodimer, using Protein A capture with ion exchange, hydrophobic interaction, mixed-mode, and preparative size-exclusion polishing.