Featured Exosome Job – Research Associate, Exosome Discovery & Production

About the role:

Mantra Bio is seeking a driven, self-motivated, and detail-oriented research associate to join our Platform Team to develop our next generation of exosome therapeutics. In this role you will produce and characterize early-stage exosome therapeutic candidates to enable well-controlled in vitro studies that will determine which exosome therapeutic candidates we advance for scale up and validation in vivo. You will be responsible for generating suspension cell culture derived exosomes; activities will include cell banking, cell expansion, transient transfections, harvesting and purification of exosomes; as well as using analytical techniques such as flow cytometry. Furthermore, you will adapt best practices for exosome production and characterization developed by our Process Sciences team, and play a role in the continued development of analytical tools to further advance our exosome platform. You will tightly collaborate with our Protein, RNA, and Data science teams to provide material and run assays. You will work closely with automation engineers to optimize workflows, including miniaturization of cell culture and exosome analysis methods. Prior hands-on experience with mammalian cell culture, aseptic technique, and process development is required. Familiarity with bioprocess development (tangential flow filtration, and AKTA-based protein purification) and analytical methods such as flow cytometry and HPLC is preferred.

Responsibilities:

• Responsible for exosome production, analysis and delivery of research grade therapeutic candidates using both transient and stable cell lines.
• Cell line maintenance, banking, and development with suspension mammalian cell culture systems.
• Develop best practices for exosome production, including engineering of mammalian cell lines, maximizing yield, and isolation of exosomes for early-stage research.
• Assist R&D scientists in the design, production, and characterization of exosomes including but not limited to transient transfection, chromatographic purification, and affinity characterization by flow cytometry or binding assays.
• Contribute to experimental protocols, reports, internal documents including SOPs, lab records, and investigations as appropriate.
• Ensure equipment is in working order and maintain accurate records of all collected data and procedures.
• Collaborate with the Protein and RNA science teams to provide material, run assays and explore production and characterization methods.
• Collaborate with our Data Science team to infer trends across different exosome engineering methods from transcriptomic and proteomic data.

Your profile:

• B.A./B.S. degree with 2+ years of experience or MS degree. Some industry experience is preferred.
• Highly proficient in transient and stable protein production as well as maintaining suspension cell cultures with excellent aseptic technique.
• Detail-oriented and able to independently plan and execute well controlled experiments; and organize, analyze, and communicate results in team meetings.
• Experience determining product quality and potency by a variety of assays including SDS-PAGE, HPLC, ELISA, and reporter cell assays.
• Nice to have some experience with: stable cell pool development, and flow cytometry.
• Excellent interpersonal skills, including clear, succinct, and timely communication and proven ability to foster strong relationships with other team members and stakeholders.
• Highly self-motivated and detail-oriented, with proven ability to work in a dynamic, fast-moving team.
• Comfortable working with a data-driven team and collaborating with research scientists, data scientists and platform engineers from different backgrounds.