Wet Lab Scientist - Ligand Discovery in Gorgulla Lab

About the role

The QAI4Bio (Quantum AI for Biology) Lab led by Dr. Christoph Gorgulla within the Center of Excellence for Data-Driven Discovery in the Structural Biology Department of St. Jude seeks a skilled and highly motivated wet lab Scientist with experience in ligand discovery. Our research group is focused on developing state-of-the-art computational methods for ligand/drug discovery, using machine learning, high-performance/cloud computing, quantum chemistry and quantum computing. Our lab also includes a wet lab dedicated to experimentally verifying the computationally predicted results in real-world drug discovery projects.

Responsibilities

• Play a pivotal role in our team by producing high-quality proteins, designing and performing binding assays by biophysical methods (SPR, MST, ITC, BLI) or Fluorescence-based (i.e. FP, TR-FRET) methods, and optimizing workflows for ligand discovery.
• Depending on your skills, you might also work on structural studies (NMR, X-ray, cryo-EM, …) and use the state-of-the-art core facilities and centers dedicated to structural studies at St. Jude.
• Work as a lab manager to oversee the day-to-day operations of the wet lab.
• Lead collaborative projects, mentor junior scientists and students, and contribute to high-impact publications.
• Closely work with our computational and other wet-lab colleagues to validate and experimentally verify the predicted hit and lead compounds.

Requirements

• High-throughput binding assays and screening automation for drug discovery.
• Experience designing assay workflows for small-molecule screening, hit confirmation, affinity and kinetic characterization, counter-screening, and assay troubleshooting.
• Experience with Surface Plasmon Resonance (SPR) for binding validation, affinity ranking, kinetics, and mechanism-of-binding analysis.
• Experience with Plate-based fluorescence assays such as FP, TR-FRET/HTRF, fluorescence intensity, or related high-throughput formats.
• Experience with automation platforms for assay setup, compound handling, serial dilution, reagent dispensing, plate-based screening, and data-quality control.
• Experience with other biophysical or biochemical binding technologies such as BLI, MST, DSF/nanoDSF, ITC, AlphaScreen/AlphaLISA, or related approaches.
• Experience with assay development, optimization, validation, controls, reproducibility, Z-factor/statistical quality assessment, and artifact/counter-screen design.
• Experience producing high-quality recombinant proteins for biochemical and biophysical assays in bacterial, insect, and/or mammalian expression systems.
• Experience with challenging targets, membrane proteins, multi-domain proteins, or protein complexes is preferred.

Qualifications

• Minimum Education and/or Training: Bachelor's degree in relevant scientific area is required.
• Minimum Experience: Eight (8) years of relevant work experience is required with a Bachelor's degree. Six (6) years of relevant work experience is required with a Master's degree. Three (3) years of relevant work experience is required with a PhD.

Skills

• Hands-on expertise in developing and executing binding assays for ligand discovery.
• Strong experimental ligand-discovery capability.
• Access to world-class structural biology core facilities at St. Jude.

Benefits

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