Research Engineer to Compound Center

Karolinska Institutet

Application deadline

January 16, 2022



Research Engineer to Compound Center

Chemical Biology Consortium Sweden, CBCS, will from 2022 be a Swedish Research Council funded infrastructure of national interest. This means that the existing capabilities will be strengthened and new capabilities and four new nodes – at Lund, Uppsala, Linköping and Gothenburg Universities, respectively, will be established. CBCS (www.CBCS.se) has been in operation since 2010 with two nodes at KI and at Umeå University, respectively, and is an infrastructure for chemical biology at Science for Life Laboratory (www.scilifelab.se) in the Chemical Biology and Genome Engineering platform. CBCS offers services for the identification of chemical tools (bioactive small-molecules) for all fields of life sciences. The infrastructure offers collaborative service and guidance within assay development, small-molecule screening and hit to chemical probe optimization. Additional service offerings in small-molecule profiling, including Cell Painting, and screening in primary and complex disease models are currently being established.

The facility comprises Scilifelab Compound Center whose assignment is to serve the Swedish research community with distributing screening libraries on assay plates while preserving the quality of our collection. We also support precision medicine through functional testing in patient-near cells by endorse profiling of small molecules and disease models at single cell level and in patient-derived cells.The collection consists of over 200 000 chemical compounds and instrumentation includes a fully automated storage system; Liconic Kiwi ST-30 combined with a Bravo liquid dispensing system (Agilent) together with an acoustic liquid dispensing platform (Echo 550 & workstation) The collection is stored under environmentally controlled conditions and regular quality campaigns are performed to maintain the integrity of the collection.

Your mission

We seek one individual within the fields of compound management and chemistry to join our team. The successful candidate will be part of an automation team and play a key role providing technical expertise in the creation of a national sample operation and expansion of capabilities to meet future needs of research. In this position you will work in a dynamic environment whilst supplying essential service to research projects across the academic world in Sweden. The work is highly collaborative, and you will join a team with collective responsibility for the overall delivery. The group has a strong emphasis on continuous improvement which you will contribute to in the form of individual and group projects.

Responsibility includes:

  • Support the team in the area of storage, retrieval, replication and distribution of small molecule libraries to academic research groups.
  • Provide support of research activities, anticipate, identify and resolve data and application issues, and implement new concepts to help manage local sample collection and impact strategic direction and priorities for research.
  • Establish and maintain a productive network of relationships within SciLifeLab and Karolinska Institutet and their collaborative partners to understand customer needs for sample plates and work to deliver the capabilities and capacities needed.
  • Contribute to and participate in the implementations to improve and update the informatics system that is integrated with the automated systems.
  • Buildup and development of an automated quality control/assurance process for our stored 10mM DMSO solutions, screening libraries and collection of solids. Involving performance of regular campaigns of routine sample analysis and evaluation of data obtained from HPLC-MS.

Your profile

We believe that you have the ability to be comfortable working at a fast pace with a goal orientated and team focused attitude. Possessing excellent communication skills with a dedicated and service minded approach is key. It is very important that you fully understand the drug discovery process and have technical proficiency along with necessary skills in chemistry, process engineering, QA and QC, automation solution development, instrument services, data management and information system development and support.

  • MSc in Bioscience or Chemistry
  • Understanding of the drug discovery process and a strong scientific knowledge foundation.
  • Ability to plan, perform and evaluate experiments to investigate improvement possibilities in a process.
  • Proficiency and deep expertise in utilizing sample management computer systems and automated storage and acoustic dispensing technologies to prepare samples. Play a critical role in creating new protocols to support system development.
  • Ability to use various IT systems with strong personal computer software knowledge, general and extended such as knowledge of SQL is valued. Proficiency skills and rapid handling in excel is required together with ability to discover deviation in a large sets of data.
  • High learning agility for specialized systems and technologies.
  • Interest in logistics and developing processes through customer interactions and technology awareness.
  • Drive and enthusiasm to solve the root cause of problems and not only overcome the presenting problem.
  • Thrive on working in a committed team and gain satisfaction from the overall performance of the group.
  • Excellent oral and written communication skills in Swedish and English with a proactive and service minded approach.
  • Experience of laboratory work handling chemical samples
  • Ability to prioritize and perform work independently as well as willingness to work across scientific disciplines to get results.

We expect you to be a positive, flexible person working in a clean and precise way. Interpersonal skills will be highly valued.

What do we offer?

Karolinska Institutet is one of the world’s leading medical universities. Our vision is to pursue the development of knowledge about life and to promote better health for all. At Karolinska Institutet, we conduct innovative medical research and provide the largest range of biomedical education in Sweden. Karolinska Institutet is a state university, which entitles employees to several benefits such as extended holiday and a generous occupational pension. Employees also have free access to our modern gym and receive reimbursements for medical care.

Location: Solna

Application

Welcome to apply at the latest 2022-01-16

Last updated: 2021-12-16

Content Responsible: David Gotthold(david.gotthold@scilifelab.se)