Cell Biologist

Overview: ORAU has a job opportunity for a Cell Biologist. This position will support of the overall functions of the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences, NIH. The position is contingent on award of an upcoming contract with SOARS, Scientific, Operations,and Administrative Resources, NIH. Salary for positions will be determined based on education and experience. Relocation support is not available for this position.
ORAU has been providing scientific and technical talent staffing solutions and designing, managing, and evaluating jobs and internships for more than 70 years. ORAU assists in connecting the best and most diverse group of students, recent graduates, faculty and professionals with world-class fellowships, internships and job opportunities, whether in national laboratories, research institutions, federal government offices or private sector R&D departments.Responsibilities:

• Work with the Antiviral Program for Pandemics to identify and develop antivirals
• Develop research plans for new projects, including strategies for primary and secondary screens and advanced characterization, including BSL2 and BSL3 viruses such as SARS-CoV-2
• Develop and-or optimize biochemical and cell-based assays, including the use of pathogenic viruses, for automated robotic screening in 384-well and 1536-well formats.
• Tissue culture, passaging, and plating, and cell line engineering to create cell-based re-porter assays.
• Perform virus titer and lot quality control studies.
• Work with staff on the interpretation of assay outcomes obtained from compound screening efforts.
• Work with staff on bioinformatic analysis of results obtained from enzyme assays.
• Co-author Research Collaborative Agreement write-ups and proposals for new collaborations between NCATS and academic institutions or private industry.
• Mentor and train trainees and staff on techniques.
• Develop and optimize biochemical and cell-based assays for profiling therapeutic interventions against divergent molecular targets and animal-human pathogens.
• Analyze the experimental results and organize findings into tables and figures.
• Evaluate new technologies and instruments resulting in proposals for new screening strategies and novel assay formats.
• Search existing literature; propose, design and test alternative assays for difficult screening targets.
• Confirm assay results and determine EC50specificity for primary active samples; develop secondary assays for follow up; communicate results to facilitate small molecule probe development.

Qualifications:

• Ph.D. in Virology, Biochemistry, Cell Biology, Molecular Biology or a related discipline. Three (3) years of specialized experience plus a Master’s degree is equivalent to a Ph.D. Five (5) years of specialized experience plus a BA/BS degree is equivalent to a Ph.D.
• Minimum of two (2) years of related experience in Biosafety Level 2 (BSL2) research environment.
• Experience in Biosafety Level 2 (BSL2) research environment.
• Operate liquid dispensing systems (Aurora FRD, Labcyte acoustic dispensers, Ther-moFisher Multidrop) and multimodal detectors/plate readers (Tecan Safire, PE ViewLux, PE EnVision, BMG PheraStar).

. Skill at maintaining accurate and detailed records of laboratory experiments. . Strong communication skills, both oral and written. . Excellent analytical, organizational and time management skills. . Ability to multi-task, set priorities and pay close attention to detail.