Scientist, Functional Genomics

About Arc Institute

The Arc Institute is a new scientific institution conducting curiosity-driven basic science and technology development to understand and treat complex human diseases. Headquartered in Palo Alto, California, Arc is an independent research organization founded on the belief that many important research programs will be enabled by new institutional models. Arc operates in partnership with Stanford University, UCSF, and UC Berkeley.

While the prevailing university research model has yielded many tremendous successes, we believe in the importance of institutional experimentation as a way to make progress. These include:

• Funding: Arc will fully fund Core Investigators’ (PIs’) research groups, liberating scientists from the typical constraints of project-based external grants.
• Technology: Biomedical research has become increasingly dependent on complex tooling. Arc Technology Centers develop, optimize and deploy rapidly advancing experimental and computational technologies in collaboration with Core Investigators. 
• Support: Arc aims to provide first-class support—operationally, financially and scientifically—that will enable scientists to pursue long-term high risk, high reward research that can meaningfully advance progress in disease cures, including neurodegeneration, cancer, and immune dysfunction.
• Culture: We believe that culture matters enormously in science and that excellence is difficult to sustain. We aim to create a culture that is focused on scientific curiosity, a deep commitment to truth, broad ambition, and selfless collaboration. 

Arc has scaled to nearly 200 people. With $650M+ in committed funding and a state of the art new lab facility in Palo Alto, Arc will continue to grow quickly in the coming years.

About the position

We are seeking a highly skilled and motivated Scientist with a strong background in functional genomics and single cell sequencing to join the Functional Genomics team inside the Genome Engineering Technology Center at the Arc Institute. This position will primarily involve applying cutting-edge functional genomics approaches for high-throughput interrogation of mammalian genomes, transcriptomes and epigenomes with rich multi-omic readouts. You will play a critical role in driving the Virtual Cell Initiative, which aims to create the first foundational model that makes accurate predictions of cellular states and their response to intervention. You will have the opportunity to work closely with other Scientists and Research Associates in Arc’s Technology Centers as well as pioneering Core Investigator labs that have developed the fundamental toolbox for genome engineering and functional genomics screens, such as CRISPR nucleases, CRISPRi, CRISPRoff, CRISPRa, and serine or bridge recombinases.

The successful candidate will work with other scientists in the team to develop and optimize groundbreaking functional genomics technologies at Arc, and lead efforts to apply these technologies to generate large-scale in vitro perturbation datasets across diverse cell types. Efforts will be focused on stem cells and other differentiated cell types. The candidate will also collaborate cross-functionally with other members of Arc’s Tech Centers in a dynamic environment to drive innovative scientific discoveries and achieve Arc’s overarching goals.

About you

• You are passionate about science and excited about answering questions related to cellular identity and states, immunology, neurobiology and complex human diseases.
• You embrace challenges and often formulate creative solutions to develop new approaches and optimize existing tools to answer complex biological questions.
• You are committed to generating high quality data and maintaining good documentation practices.
• You enjoy working collaboratively with others and thrive in a fast-paced, dynamic work environment.
• You are diligent, detail oriented, and excels at troubleshooting.
• You excel at organization, time management and task prioritization, and enjoy driving multiple projects in parallel.

In this position you will

• Independently execute large in vitro perturbation screens in diverse cell types, generate high quality single-cell perturbation datasets, and collaborate cross-functionally to analyze and interpret research findings.
• Work with our interdisciplinary teams to further optimize functional genomics platforms and CRISPR technologies.
• Interact cross-functionally with computational and machine learning teams to devise strategies to train and evaluate applications of an AI virtual cell model.
• Utilize project management systems to track progress and adhere to timelines, and document experimental data on ELN/LIMS in an organized manner.
• Embrace the opportunity to creatively collaborate with Core Investigators on ad hoc early research projects and with other Technology Centers to push our Virtual Cell Atlas and Alzheimer Disease Initiatives.
• Stay updated on advancements in the field of functional genomics and single cell omics by reading the literature and attending key Conferences.
• Present key research findings at internal meetings and seminars, and external conferences.

Requirements

• PhD in Cell biology, Molecular Biology, Medicine, Genomics, or another relevant field. Post-PhD experience is a plus.
• Deep experience working with different CRISPR-Cas9, other genome editing or perturbation techniques in a high throughput format (e.g. pooled or large arrayed libraries). 
• Experience in mammalian cell culture, and familiarity working with primary cells and/or other difficult cell models. Experience working with stem cells and differentiated cell types is a strong plus.
• Hands-on experience with downstream genomics protocols, especially scRNAseq.
• Experience with using various project management systems, ELN and LIMS (e.g. Asana, Benchling).
• Demonstrated ability to work both independently and in a highly collaborative multidisciplinary environment.
• Strong project management skills with the ability to independently plan, execute, and deliver results on time.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience working with stem cells (e.g. ESC, iPSC) and stem cell derived cell types.
• Experience with designing and cloning large pooled CRISPR sgRNA libraries.
• Experience in multi-color flow cytometry and FACS-based sorting.
• Ability to analyze large and complex data sets using Python, R, or similar tools.
• Experience in molecular biology and/or protein engineering.

The base salary range for this position is $121,250 to $150,000. These amounts reflect the range of base salary that the Institute reasonably would expect to pay a new hire or internal candidate for this position. The actual base compensation paid to any individual for this position may vary depending on factors such as experience, market conditions, education/training, skill level, and whether the compensation is internally equitable, and does not include bonuses, commissions, differential pay, other forms of compensation, or benefits. This position is also eligible to receive an annual discretionary bonus, with the amount dependent on individual and institute performance factors.