Scientist I/II, Target Biology

Scientist I/II, Target Biology at Fulcrum Therapeutics

* Fulcrum requires all employees to be fully vaccinated against COVID-19. This requirement is a condition of employment at Fulcrum, and it applies regardless of whether or not the position is located onsite at Fulcrum's headquarters in Cambridge, MA. If you are unable to receive the vaccine due to a serious medical condition, or because it is prohibited as a result of your sincerely held religious beliefs, you will have an opportunity to request a reasonable accommodation.

Company Overview

Fulcrum Therapeutics is a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company focused on improving the lives of patients with genetically defined rare diseases in areas of high unmet medical need. Fulcrum's two lead programs in clinical development are losmapimod, a small molecule for the treatment of facioscapulohumeral muscular dystrophy (FSHD) and FTX-6058, a small molecule designed to increase expression of fetal hemoglobin for the treatment of sickle cell disease and other hemoglobinopathies, including beta-thalassemia. The company's proprietary product engine, FulcrumSeekTM, identifies drug targets that can modulate gene expression to treat the known root cause of gene mis-expression.

Description

The Target Biology group is seeking an innovative and self-motivated Scientist I/II to play a vital role in the advancement of high priority drug discovery projects through the design, development, and execution of decision-making in vitro cell-based assays. The primary objectives of the scientist in this role will be to critically interrogate disease biology and targets that arise from our pioneering high-throughput discovery engine, FulcrumSeekTM. As a key contributor, you will work in close collaboration with scientists across the Discovery Biology and Data Science teams to make a direct impact on target validation and discovery of novel therapeutic treatments for rare disease.

Responsibilities

• Lead the design, development and execution of in vitro assays as required for the advancement of high priority projects
• Use chemical probes and genetic perturbation techniques (CRISPR, RNAi) for target discovery and validation in disease relevant cell models
• Collaborate with target discovery and computational biology teams to identify and prioritize novel targets for rare genetic diseases that come from Fulcrum's proprietary product engine.
• Develop and deploy new assays related to disease and target biology
• Present and discuss results with the Fulcrum research team and the external research community
• Communicate effectively within a cross functional team of cell and molecular biologists, data scientists, and business development leaders
• Maintain accurate and timely documentation and organization of experiments and data in an electronic lab notebook

Qualifications

• Ph.D. with a degree in cell/molecular biology, (or related area) and 2+ years of relevant experience in an academic or industry setting
• Expertise with cell culture models relevant to hematology, cardiomyopathy, and / or neuroscience indications with a proven track record in assay development, implementation, and execution
• Experience with knockdown or over-expression techniques in in vitro models including CRISPR, shRNA, ASO or lentiviral overexpression along with chemical probes to validate or invalidate disease targets
• Experience with standard molecular biology laboratory methods including conventional PCR, qRT-PCR, ELISA and Western blotting.
• Demonstrated ability to thrive in a collaborative team environment
• Strong hands-on experimental background with a rigorous, analytical approach to problem solving
• Experience with characterizing and applying patient-derived cell cultures to model disease states preferred.
• Familiarity with the interpretation of large data sets generated from NGS or high content imaging. Bioinformatic experience and experience using Python/R scripts for analysis is a plus
• Background in of neurobiology, hematology and / or cardiac biology is a plus