Senior Scientist, Antibody Discovery and Engineering

Location: Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States; 100% onsite

Salary: $130,800–$209,400 per year, with potential discretionary bonus, incentive compensation, or equity.

Company

hirify.global develops mRNA-based medicines and vaccines across infectious diseases, immuno-oncology, rare diseases, and cardiovascular diseases.

What you will do

• Lead experimental protein and antibody engineering workstreams from library design and construction through selection, characterization, optimization, and lead identification.
• Design and execute yeast surface display workflows, including FACS-based selection, affinity maturation, specificity optimization, and multi-parameter lead enrichment.
• Translate computational protein design hypotheses, sequence and structure predictions, and model outputs into experimental constructs and libraries.
• Engineer and characterize antibody formats including IgG, Fab, scFv, VHH, bispecific and multispecific antibodies, T-cell engagers, and related therapeutic formats.
• Analyze display-selection, sequence, NGS, biochemical, biophysical, and functional data to identify structure–function relationships and guide lead selection.
• Independently troubleshoot complex experiments, contribute to scientific strategy, communicate findings, and provide guidance to junior colleagues and collaborators.

Requirements

• PhD in protein engineering, molecular biology, biochemistry, immunology, cancer biology, or a related discipline, plus 2+ years of relevant post-PhD industry experience.
• Strong hands-on experience with yeast surface display, including library design and construction, FACS-based screening or selection, affinity maturation, and specificity optimization.
• Strong antibody and protein engineering knowledge, including cloning, mutagenesis, sequence analysis, construct design, expression, purification, and analytical characterization.
• Experience collaborating with computational protein design, bioinformatics, structural biology, or antigen design teams.
• Experience analyzing sequence-rich datasets and using antibody characterization methods such as Biacore, Carterra, Octet, ELISA, MSD, or flow cytometry.
• Ability to work 100% onsite in Cambridge, Massachusetts and operate effectively in a fast-paced, cross-functional research environment.

Nice to have

• Experience with advanced yeast or mammalian display, deep sequencing, multiplexed selections, or high-throughput variant characterization.
• Experience with structure-guided, de novo, or AI/ML-enabled protein design and developability prediction.
• Experience engineering T-cell engagers, TCR engagers, bispecific or multispecific antibodies, ADCs, CAR-T, or CAR-NK-related formats.
• Experience with immunization-based or B-cell-based antibody discovery, functional cell-based assays, or immune-cell biology.

Culture & Benefits

• In-person, collaborative research environment with direct mentorship and hands-on scientific partnership.
• Healthcare and voluntary benefit programs.
• Fitness, mindfulness, mental health, family planning, fertility, adoption, and surrogacy support.
• Paid vacation, volunteer days, sabbatical, global recharge days, and discretionary year-end shutdown.
• Savings and investment programs, plus location-specific benefits.