Senior Scientist - CRISPR / Construct Design in City of London

An exciting opportunity has arisen to join a newly funded, early-stage biotechnology company developing a highly ambitious programmable therapeutics platform for oncology. Having recently secured significant seed funding, the company is now expanding its scientific team as it progresses its platform from validation into preclinical development across multiple cancer indications. Their technology is focused on engineering programmable therapeutic systems that can recognise disease-defining genetic features and selectively act within target cells, creating the potential to address oncology indications that remain difficult to treat through conventional therapeutic approaches.

This is a hands-on, high-throughput role at the core of the company’s platform. You will be responsible for designing, building and iterating on novel CRISPR-based therapeutic constructs, helping to shape the candidates that move into preclinical development.

• Join a recently seed-funded biotech at a pivotal stage of scientific and company growth
• Help build a novel oncology platform based on programmable, target-selective therapeutic biology
• Work directly on the therapeutic constructs that underpin the company’s lead programmes
• Apply cutting-edge molecular cloning, protein engineering and CRISPR/Cas expertise in a fast-moving environment
• Play a key role in expanding the platform across multiple oncology indications

As Molecular Cloning & Protein Engineering Scientist, you will be responsible for engineering and building the therapeutic constructs at the core of the platform. This is a highly hands-on role suited to a scientist who enjoys rapid construct design, molecular cloning, protein engineering and iterative experimental cycles. You will design and build novel Cas-based therapeutic payloads, engineer constructs for improved specificity and controlled activity, and help expand the programmability of the platform to additional oncogenic targets. Your work will directly influence the therapeutic candidates that enter preclinical development and will sit at the interface of molecular biology, protein engineering, CRISPR technology and oncology.

• Designing and constructing engineered Cas-based therapeutic payloads, including conditional protein architectures
• Engineering constructs for enhanced target specificity and controlled activity through directed evolution
• Expanding the programmability of the platform to additional oncogenic targets and demonstrating modular scalability
• Designing and cloning guide RNA libraries for specificity profiling assays, including ONE-seq and CHANGE-seq
• Building and iterating mammalian and bacterial expression vectors to support platform and candidate development
• Supporting stable cell line generation and reporter assay development for construct validation
• Executing rapid-turnaround construct builds in a high-throughput, fast-moving research environment
• Working closely with biology and translational teams to connect construct design with downstream functional performance

• MS or PhD in Molecular Biology, Genetics, Bioengineering or a related discipline
• 5+ years of hands-on molecular cloning experience, including Gibson Assembly, Golden Gate and/or Gateway cloning
• Deep expertise in CRISPR/Cas construct design and engineering
• Experience with directed evolution approaches for construct optimisation
• Proficiency in mammalian and bacterial expression vector design
• Experience with stable cell line generation
• Demonstrated ability to execute rapid-turnaround, iterative construct builds
• Experience with reporter assay systems, including fluorescent and/or luminescent assays

• Experience with conditional protein systems, such as inducible domains
• Familiarity with base editing or prime editing construct design
• NGS library preparation experience for guide RNA screening platforms
• Background in structural biology or protein biochemistry

This is an excellent opportunity for a molecular cloning and protein engineering scientist to join a recently funded oncology biotech at an early and highly influential stage, working on a novel therapeutic platform with the potential to reshape how genetically defined cancers are targeted.