Research Scientist, Protein Design & Engineering at Dayhoff Labs

About us

We're reverse-engineering the origin of life — one of the great unsolved problems in science, and one we think AI finally makes tractable. Understanding this transition, from geochemistry to biochemistry, is what will let us orchestrate molecular networks and build systems that are more capable, adaptive, and efficient.

If we succeed, the applications are vast: catalysis, green synthesis, ab initio synthetic biology, programmable matter. Understanding and harnessing these processes could let ten billion of us thrive on this planet — and let life keep evolving beyond it.

We're a small, diverse team of AI engineers, computational scientists, and bench scientists. We hold ourselves to the rigor of a research institute, but we ship like an engineering firm. Global team, HQs in Cambridge, MA and London, UK.

The role

You'll engineer proteins to carry out useful chemistry, combining enzyme discovery, directed evolution, and experimental characterisation. You'll own the experimental cycle: choosing starting points, building variant libraries, developing screens, and establishing which changes improve function and why.

This is a hands-on role working closely with our computational and ML teams. You'll test designed proteins at the bench, use experimental results to guide subsequent rounds, and develop enzymes with the activity, selectivity, and stability needed for their intended application. There’s no fixed screening pipeline to inherit — you'll help decide how we build it.

What you'll do

• Design and run protein engineering campaigns, from initial enzyme selection and library design through screening and characterisation of improved variants.

• Build and express variant libraries using site-directed, random, and combinatorial mutagenesis.

• Develop assays and high-throughput screens that reliably measure the properties we're trying to improve.

• Express, purify, and characterise proteins, measuring kinetics, substrate scope, selectivity, and stability under relevant reaction conditions.

• Work with computational scientists to test proposed designs, interpret successes and failures, and use the results to guide the next round.

• Develop enzymatic reactions and cascades, identifying how enzyme performance, cofactors, and reaction conditions affect overall productivity.

Essential experience

We're interested in the engineering campaigns you've run, the assays you've built, and what you learned from them. We care about:

• A track record of improving protein or enzyme function through directed evolution or rational engineering.

• Practical fluency in molecular biology, including cloning, library construction, mutagenesis, and recombinant protein expression.

• Experience developing and troubleshooting enzyme assays and screening workflows, with appropriate controls and follow-up validation.

• A solid grasp of enzyme mechanism, kinetics, and structure–function relationships, and the ability to use these to guide experiments.

• Experience independently taking projects through multiple design–build–test cycles and explaining what drove the results.

Highly preferred

• Experience with industrial biocatalysis or engineering enzymes for demanding reaction conditions.

• Experience integrating liquid handling and laboratory automation with high-throughput screening.

• Familiarity with biosensor-based screens, growth-based selection, or FACS.

• Experience testing computationally designed proteins and feeding experimental results back into design.

• Experience with enzyme cascades, fermentation, or transferring enzymatic processes from the bench to larger scales.

Logistics

This is a full-time, on-site role in Cambridge, MA. Compensation is highly competitive. We're also able to sponsor visas for the right candidate.

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