Principal Scientist / Associate Director - Peptide Medicinal Chemistry

Location: 22 Strathmore Rd, Natick, MA, US. On-site.

Company

hirify.global is a global contract research, development, and manufacturing organization providing integrated drug discovery and development services to pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies. The peptide discovery group uses mRNA Display, Phage Display, Peptide DNA-Encoded Libraries, and peptide chemistry to discover and optimize macrocyclic peptide therapeutics.

What you will do

• Lead medicinal chemistry strategies for peptide and macrocyclic peptide hit-to-lead and lead optimization programs, providing scientific direction to multidisciplinary teams.
• Translate screening hits into optimized lead series through rational design, analogue synthesis, iterative SAR development, and focused follow-up libraries.
• Develop SAR hypotheses using sequence scanning, amino acid substitution, conformational constraint, structure-guided approaches, and chemical modifications.
• Integrate binding, kinetic, biophysical, structural, functional, stability, permeability, physicochemical, PK/PD, and in vivo data into analogue design and compound prioritization.
• Collaborate with display, DEL, peptide chemistry, structural, computational, biochemical, cellular, ADME, and DMPK teams to advance discovery programs.
• Provide scientific leadership and mentorship, communicate program recommendations to project teams and senior scientific leadership, and identify scientific risks and opportunities.

Requirements

• Ph.D. in Medicinal Chemistry, Peptide Chemistry, Organic Chemistry, Chemical Biology, or a related discipline.
• 7+ years of relevant experience in peptide therapeutics, peptide medicinal chemistry, or drug discovery.
• Demonstrated success progressing peptide or macrocyclic peptide programs through hit-to-lead and lead optimization.
• Strong track record of SAR exploration and translating screening hits into optimized lead compounds.
• Ability to independently develop and execute medicinal chemistry strategies and make data-driven optimization decisions.
• Experience leading multidisciplinary drug discovery programs and working across discovery functions.
• Strong expertise in peptide medicinal chemistry, SAR-driven optimization, peptide design, and macrocycle design.
• Experience with solid-phase peptide synthesis, peptide characterization, LC-MS, and HPLC.
• Strong written and verbal communication skills, including communicating SAR, experimental results, optimization strategies, and recommendations to multidisciplinary teams and senior scientific leadership.
• Ability to work independently while collaborating effectively across discovery functions.

Nice to have

• Postdoctoral experience in peptide drug discovery or medicinal chemistry.
• Experience mentoring scientists and providing scientific direction to project teams.
• Experience with noncanonical amino acids or chemically modified peptides.
• Familiarity with structural biology and computational approaches to peptide design.
• Experience with macrocyclic peptide therapeutics, mRNA Display, Phage Display, Peptide DNA-Encoded Libraries, peptide backbone modification, structure-based peptide design, or peptide ADME and developability optimization.
• Experience interpreting X-ray crystallography or cryo-EM data and applying structural insights to peptide design.
• Experience with protein-protein interaction targets, intracellular peptide therapeutics, or internal and external peptide chemistry resources.

Culture & Benefits

• Cross-functional collaboration across global peptide discovery and medicinal chemistry teams.
• Opportunity to contribute to the development of medicinal chemistry capabilities within the peptide discovery organization.
• Work with pharmaceutical and biotechnology clients and external collaborators.
• Equal opportunity employment.