Medra
Research Associate, Protein Purification & Quality Control
San Francisco · Mid · Internship
Sponsorship not specifiedDetected 53 days ago
PythonData AnalysisRoboticsMolecular BiologyCell CultureResearchMass SpectrometryProtein Analysis
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odds of building a lasting career here
37Risky
Cap-exempt (no lottery)0
Sponsors this role80
Entry-level history0
PERM / green-card track0
Lottery odds40
Fits your clock70
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About the role
- Expression, capture and polishing chromatography, and purity and monomericity analysis are the daily bread of this role, and you'll play a hands-on part in making them reproducible, automation-ready, and reliable.
- This is a role for someone early in their career who loves being at the bench, has strong hands-on instincts, and is eager to grow their protein science under the guidance of experienced scientists.
- You'll work closely with roboticists and software engineers to bring cell culture, purification, and QC into routine autonomous execution on our platform.
Responsibilities
- Perform protein purification on AKTA (FPLC) and KingFisher platforms - affinity capture, polishing, buffer exchange, and magnetic-bead-based processing
- Execute analytical QC by SEC (analytical UPLC/HPLC) to assess purity, aggregation, and monomericity, and support additional QC as needed (concentration, endotoxin, SDS-PAGE)
- Execute purification and QC according to established SOPs, and help refine and document protocols as workflows mature
- Partner with roboticists and software engineers to translate manual purification and QC steps into reliable, high-throughput autonomous protocols - including sample handling, deck/plate setup, and data pipeline integration
- Perform first-pass data analysis and QC on chromatograms and SEC traces, tracking yield and purity and flagging anomalies for review
- Maintain rigorous, well-organized experimental records in electronic lab notebooks (ELN) and support reproducibility across every batch you produce
Requirements
- B.S. or M.S. in biochemistry, molecular biology, chemical/biological engineering, or a related discipline, with hands-on laboratory experience (research, internship, or 0-2+ years of industry/academic lab work)
- Hands-on experience with protein purification - chromatography on AKTA/FPLC and/or bead-based purification - and comfort taking a sample from lysate or supernatant to purified protein
- Strong documentation habits, attention to detail, and the ability to juggle multiple tasks in parallel
- Hands-on experience with analytical SEC or other analytical chromatography (UPLC/HPLC)
- Experience with automated or high-throughput purification (e.g., KingFisher, multi-column AKTA, robotic purification)
- Experience with mammalian expression systems (CHO/HEK) and transient transfection at scale
- Experience with lab automation or liquid handling platforms (e.g., Dynamic Devices Lynx, Tempest)
- Familiarity with alternative binder formats - VHHs, bispecifics, Fc-fusions, or non-Ig scaffolds
- Hands-on wet-lab experience and comfort at the bench - mammalian cell culture, aseptic technique, pipetting, and careful execution of detailed protocols
- Curiosity about protein biochemistry and analytical characterization, and eagerness to learn the theory and practical pitfalls (aggregation, capture chemistry, buffer conditions, column behavior)
- A basic understanding of antibody structure and function, or a strong desire to learn it
- A scrappy, can-do attitude - you figure things out, ask good questions, and get things done
- Basic scripting or data-handling skills (Python/R) for organizing and analyzing purification and QC data
- An opportunity to change the way that scientific research happens
Benefits
- Significant equity ownership
- Medical and dental insurance
Company info
- At Medra, our mission is to use AI, robotics, and biology to accelerate life science research, with the ultimate goal of eradicating disease.
- We have been quietly building the foundational layers of our
- Physical AI Scientist platform:
- 🤖 Physical AI that can operate scientific instruments with human-level dexterity.
- 🧪 Scientific AI that can analyze results, reason about next steps, and close the loop autonomously.
- This is an incredibly ambitious mission, but we believe that a team of ambitious people with high ownership can accomplish incredible things.
- We are looking for a Research Associate to help build and run protein production and quality control on the Medra Physical AI platform.
This listing is sourced directly from Medra's careers page and normalized into a canonical job model.