Research Assistant Jobs in Spokane, WA

Moonlight Bio is a Seattle-based, preclinical stage biotech company pioneering the development of cutting-edge cell therapies for the treatment of cancer. Our team consists of collaborative and passionate individuals focused on designing innovative technologies and therapeutic candidates with the potential to transform the lives of cancer patients. Our teams engage across the entire drug development landscape, pursuing opportunities in discovery & mechanistic research, component design & screening, preclinical modeling, process & analytical development, translational & correlative studies, innovative clinical development strategies, and partnerships necessary to enable and transform our core technologies into groundbreaking cell-based medicines. Roles & Responsibilities: We are seeking a phenomenal computational biologist and leader who is motivated to apply their expertise across a wide range of activities, from exploratory research projects through to candidate development and clinical translation. This role is pivotal in establishing Moonlight's computational strategies and capabilities, in driving our lead therapies toward clinical studies, and in extracting and integrating novel insights across our emerging pipeline and discovery efforts. The successful candidate will work on-site or, if remote, spend significant time at our office and laboratory located in Seattle's Eastlake neighborhood. The ideal candidate will have a strong programming foundation across multiple relevant languages and have extensive experience integrating a range of quantitative and statistical methods to cumulatively collect, process, analyze, visualize, and interpret complex biological and genetic data. Most importantly, the successful candidate will have a track record of extracting decision-driving insights as well as effectively communicating them across many organizational levels, including to program and leadership teams, executives and/or board of directors. The ideal candidate will have experience in applying their skillsets across the gene editing and/or cell and gene therapy fields, inclusive of supporting regulatory filings and clinical data management, and have demonstrated a capacity to devise and execute innovative solutions and approaches to challenging scientific and business-related problems. He/she will additionally bring curiosity, excitement, and commitment to helping tackle the exciting challenges of company building and complex therapeutics development. This position offers unique leadership responsibilities and growth opportunities that come with conceiving and setting computational strategy and direction, and that extend beyond the core competencies of the role itself. Objectives & responsibilities for this role include: Collaborating with research teams to: · Implement innovative computational methods to support and help iterate across a broad range of discovery efforts · Drive disease-target relationship assessment, support target selection and de-risking and associated binder discovery campaigns · Support the design, implementation, and analysis of protein modeling and protein engineering projects · Work closely with experimental biologists to design and analyze functional genomics and perturbation screens · Support multi-omics analyses of T cells undergoing anti-tumor responses across a variety of model systems · Design, develop, and maintain robust computational pipelines for high-throughput sequencing data, including single-cell transcriptomics, ATAC-seq, and other relevant multi-omics datasets Collaborating with program teams to: · Serve as SME for genotoxicity assessments, developing and/or validating pipelines to characterize on- and off-target gene editing outcomes and associated risk characterizations · Provide technical know-how and implement best practices in data management, ensuring traceability, security, and compliance with regulatory requirements · Collaborate with key vendors responsible for clinical data management plans, systems, and analyses · Lead the integration of preclinical and clinical data, supporting translational efforts to identify predictive biomarkers, correlate with clinical signals, and drive mechanistic insights into therapy response and resistance Collaborating with senior and executive leadership teams to: · Serve as Moonlight's lead data strategist, identifying and integrating opportunities that best support our product development mission and associated business needs We are looking for candidates who possess the following qualifications: · PhD in a life-sciences related and computational biology intensive program · 8+ years of post-graduate experience, with a minimum of 5 years of industry experience in genomics, gene editing, and/or cell therapy related fields · Applied expertise in a wide variety of computational tools/methods impacting discovery and translational projects Familiarity with regulatory requirements for computational and bioinformatics analyses in the gene editing field · Background knowledge of disease/target assessments and biomarker/correlative analysis in the cell therapy field · Track record of contributing to successful IND filings Experience with cloud computing environments (AWS, Azure, etc) for scalable data processing Experience in AI/ML approaches as applied to protein modeling and design · Familiarity with transcriptomic (bulk, single-cell, spatial) and approaches and analytics · Ability to work effectively and collaboratively across dynamic, fast-paced teams accountable for several concurrent projects and deliverables Exercises sound discretion and judgement and proactive approach towards problem-solving and innovation · Exceptional organizational skills and data/code documentation · Excellent written and oral presentation skills, able to present complicated concepts to a wide range of stakeholders What you should know: · The anticipated base pay range for this position at commencement of employment is expected to be between $175,000 - $245,000 per year. · However, base pay offered may vary depending on a variety of individualized factors, including the relevance, and years, of the applicant's experience, certifications, qualifications, and/or professional licenses held, and market location. · Applicants will be eligible for employee benefits including PTO, subsidized on-site parking, medical, dental, and vision plans from your first day of employment. Further, Moonlight supports its team members in pursuing certifications, conferences, and training relevant to their roles. At Moonlight Bio, we are committed to cultivating and fostering a diverse team, providing equal employment opportunities to all employees and applicants without regard to characteristics and statuses protected under applicable federal, state, and local laws. Applicants must be authorized to work in the United States. Moonlight Bio will not sponsor applicants for work visas. Join us at Moonlight Bio and contribute to groundbreaking research that has the potential to create innovative and powerful new cancer therapies! With our collaborative, team-centric R&D approach, and our dedication to professional development, you'll have the opportunity to make a meaningful impact on patients' lives while advancing your career in the dynamic field of cell therapy.