Research Leader

Research Leader ( In-Vitro Pharmacology), London

Isomorphic Labs is a new Alphabet company that is reimagining drug discovery through a computational- and AI-first approach.

We are on a mission to accelerate the speed, increase the efficacy and lower the cost of drug discovery. You'll be working at the cutting edge of the new era of 'digital biology' to deliver a transformative social impact for the benefit of millions of people.

Come and be part of a multi-disciplinary team driving groundbreaking innovation and play a meaningful role in contributing towards us achieving our ambitious goals, while being a part of an inspiring, collaborative and entrepreneurial culture.

Your impact

Isomorphic labs are seeking a leader to confidently provide scientific leadership, strategic guidance and development of a high performing in-vitro pharmacology sub team within our translational science team working in multidisciplinary ML based drug discovery medical research.

This is an exciting opportunity to work closely with world leading AI, ML and drug design experts to develop imaginative new ways to test biological hypotheses and build a deep mechanistic understanding of drug target interactions to drive our projects forward.

The in-vitro pharmacology sub-team under your leadership will play a key pivotal role in defining the screening cascades for our drug design projects, advancing our oncology, immunology and partnership portfolios from early Drug Discovery through to Candidate Selection and ultimately to Clinical Phase work.

You will have experience of working broadly across drug discovery projects and have the ability to think originally and critically, knowing when to apply innovative ideas, and think with a beginners' mindset.

What you will do

• Lead a team
  • Designing efficient and comprehensive biological screening cascades for a variety of internal drug design programs
  • Integrating within and leading projects to provide strategic input to deliver project success
  • Working with CROs to design decision-making experiments, and deliver the highest quality biological data to inform the path to the clinic
  • Providing expertise to the AI/ML teams in developing world leading models of biological systems
  • Distilling biological data into useful insights and recommendations for project teams and ML research
  • Contributing relevant regulatory documentation for preclinical work
• Work cross-functionally with our Drug Design and Technology key partners ensuring that in-vitro pharmacology data is robust and of sufficient quality and is generated, ingested and communicated with appropriate recommendations in accordance with stakeholder expectations
• Proactively work and communicate with leadership and key partners to ensure that all in-vitro pharmacology activities are adequately resourced/supported

Skills and qualifications

Essential:

• BSc, MSc or PhD in a relevant field of biology
• Extensive experience in the pharmaceutical/biotech industry leading an in-vitro pharmacology function
• Extensive experience in the design and implementation of biological screening cascades applied to drug design projects across Hit identification, Hit-to-Lead, Lead Optimisation and Candidate Selection phases and where directed medicinal chemistry, HTS and fragment based screening approaches have been employed
• Deep solid understanding of innovative in-vitro, biophysical, biochemical and cellular assay techniques, including (but not limited to) ELISA, HTRF, FP, Cellular Proliferation/Health, (nano)BRET, High Content Screening, Reporter Gene assays for diverse target classes - knows the right assays to choose for particular target and context
• Significant knowledge of the best in-vitro pharmacology CROs with a proven track record of maintaining CRO relationships to deliver high quality biological data in a timely manner
• Fosters a healthy team work environment creating and identifying opportunities for development and progression of the team
• Driven and focussed approach to achieve the goal of Candidate delivery in the most efficient manner through flexibly maintaining and communicating high levels of scientific rigour, customer focus and team workload prioritisation
• Dynamic, agile, and flexible team leader who can proactively plan resources across many projects anticipating and planning for potential resource bottlenecks
• Collaborative and inclusive mentality to partner across teams to drive shared learning
• An effective communicator across a broad interdisciplinary team, working effectively with others with different skills and backgrounds

Nice to have:

• Project leadership experience
• Track record of contributing to drug design projects which have then delivered Clinical Candidates
• Working knowledge of designing and implementing assays and screening cascades for alternative modalities or alternative chemistries e.g ADCs or molecular glues
• Knowledge/Concept of machine learning modelling applied to biological systems
• Experience of working with multiple biological mechanisms and disease indications