Senior Principal Research Scientist, Computational Chemistry

About the role

IDEAYA is a precision medicine oncology company dedicated to discovering, developing, and commercializing transformative therapies for cancer. Our approach integrates expertise in small-molecule drug discovery, structural biology, and bioinformatics with internal capabilities in identifying and validating translational biomarkers to develop tailored, potentially first-in-class targeted therapies aligned with the genetic drivers of disease.

We have a deep pipeline of product candidates focusing on synthetic lethality and antibody-drug conjugates (ADCs) for molecularly defined solid tumor indications. Our mission is to bring forth the next wave of precision oncology therapies that are more selective, more effective, and deeply personalized, aiming to alter the course of disease and improve clinical outcomes for patients with cancer.

At IDEAYA, you will be surrounded by brilliant minds working on precision medicine therapies to help cancer patients. We are passionate and committed to being at the forefront of oncology medicine, which means we all have a high internal drive that is at the core of every person at IDEAYA. We are inquisitive, ask deep questions, and are data-driven innovators who like to collaborate and use teamwork to move science forward.

Job Summary

IDEAYA Biosciences is seeking an accomplished Senior Principal Research Scientist in Computational Chemistry with significant pharmaceutical industry experience to join our multidisciplinary small molecule drug discovery organization.

Position Summary

We are seeking an accomplished Senior Principal Research Scientist in Computational Chemistry with significant pharmaceutical industry experience to join our multidisciplinary small molecule drug discovery organization. This is a senior individual contributor role for a highly experienced computational chemist with a strong track record of advancing pharmaceutical discovery programs through hands-on scientific impact.

What you’ll do

• Lead structure-based drug design meetings with medicinal chemists and provide senior-level, hands-on drug design and computational chemistry support to small molecule drug discovery project teams
• Contribute to programs from target identification through lead optimization and drug candidate selection
• Apply structure-, ligand-, and fragment-based modeling to guide medicinal chemistry design
• Use molecular dynamics, free energy methods, quantum chemistry, and cheminformatics to address complex design and prioritization questions
• Translate computational analyses into clear, actionable compound design recommendations
• Serve as a highly experienced computational contributor and scientific advisor within project teams
• Mentor and coach other scientists in structure-based drug design through technical guidance and scientific discussion
• Evaluate new computational methods, tools, and workflows and apply them when they add clear value
• Maintain scientific rigor, reproducibility, and best practices in an industry drug discovery environment

Requirements

• PhD in Computational Chemistry or a related discipline with 9+ years of pharmaceutical or biotechnology industry experience
• Strong understanding of small molecule drug discovery and medicinal chemistry principles
• Demonstrated expertise in structure-, ligand-, and fragment-based drug discovery
• Expertise in free energy perturbation, molecular dynamics, quantum mechanics, cheminformatics, and ligand affinity estimation methods
• Proven ability to independently deliver computational work that influences medicinal chemistry decisions and project outcomes
• Excellent oral and written communication skills
• Experience applying machine learning or AI methods to molecular design, property prediction, or compound prioritization
• Experience with Schrödinger modeling software and others (e.g., MOE, OpenEye)
• Programming, scripting, statistics, and data analysis experience applied to drug discovery
• Experience working on challenging target classes, including protein–protein interactions and allosteric pockets
• Track record of contributing to discovery programs that advance high-quality small molecule drug candidates

Total Rewards

The expected salary range for the role of Senior Principal Research Scientist, Computational Chemistry is $196,000 - $242,000. The final salary offered to a successful candidate will depend on several factors that may include but are not limited to the office location where this open position is located, the final candidates’ experience within their profession, experience in the disease areas we are striving to make an impact in as a company, length of time within the industry, educational background, and performance during the interview process.

Pay

The final salary offered to a successful candidate will depend on several factors that may include but are not limited to the office location where this open position is located, the final candidates’ experience within their profession, experience in the disease areas we are striving to make an impact in as a company, length of time within the industry, educational background, and performance during the interview process.

Schedule

This position is based in our South San Francisco headquarter office and required to be onsite four days per week per our company policy.