Staff Scientist - Vaccine Research

About the Role

Join the forefront of groundbreaking research at the Beckman Research Institute of City of Hope, where we're changing lives and making a real difference in the fight against cancer, diabetes, and other life-threatening illnesses. A Staff Scientist position is available in the Vaccine Research Laboratory of Dr. Don Diamond in the Department of Hematology & Hematopoietic Cell Transplantation. The role is part of a multi-disciplinary research team tasked to develop a neoantigen-based cancer vaccine for clinical use.

We received favorable comments from the FDA on our Pre-IND submission utilizing a highly efficient and fully synthetic poxvirus-vectored vaccine platform that has already been derisked by its use in Phase 2 clinical trials as a Covid-19 vaccine (see NCT04977024, NCT05672355, and NCT04639466). For further background, refer to these publications: doi:10.3390/vaccines11091492, PMC7705736, PMC8906816, PMID33257686, PMID31739399. Earlier publications describe the platform and a p53-expressing MVA as a clinical therapeutic in cancer patients (10.1158/2767-9764.CRC-23-0394, PMC8802616, PMC5856606, and PMC5706612).

Responsibilities

• Join a highly productive research team developing and characterizing recombinant vaccine vectors incorporating neoantigens identified by proprietary bioinformatic pipelines.
• Test vaccine candidates for in vivo immunogenicity and protective efficacy in different animal tumor models.
• Apply understanding and prior experience with construction and use of viral vaccine carriers of antigens in animal models.
• Work with tumor immunology, including transplantable tumor cell lines in congenic mouse models.
• Apply knowledge of human immunology (preferred).
• Independently document scientific progress and write research articles.

Requirements

• PhD degree in an appropriate discipline such as cellular or tumor immunology or related fields.
• Minimum of 3 years of experience in relevant laboratory work (preferred).
• Interest and knowledge in vaccine research and neoantigen-based vaccine methods.

Skills

• Hands-on experience with preclinical animal models, particularly orthotopic tumor models, including animal handling, tumor cell injections, and routine tumor measurements.
• Knowledge and experience with ultrasound imaging for tumor monitoring (preferred).
• Experience in multi-color flow cytometry, ELISPOT, measurement of tumor growth by optical imaging, tumor physiology and growth markers, and cell culture.
• Proficiency in related laboratory techniques.

Pay

City of Hope employees pay is based on work experience, qualifications, and work location.

Benefits

To learn more about our comprehensive benefits, visit this page.