{"id":2659704,"url":"https://alion.io/job/cartography-principal-scientist-associate-director-developability-protein-sciences","title":"Principal Scientist / Associate Director, Developability & Protein Sciences","company":{"id":671579,"name":"Cartography","domain":"cartography.bio","url":"https://alion.io/company/cartography-3","size_band":null,"is_staffing_agency":false,"employer_type":"direct","is_intermediary":false,"listed_via":null,"ats_vendor":"Rippling","truth_index":null},"role":"Science & Research","role_family":"Science & Research","seniority":"head","employment_type":"full_time","work_mode":"on_site","remote_scope":null,"remote_scope_basis":null,"remote_working_hours":null,"hiring_geo_confidence":"structured","locations":["South San Francisco, United States"],"countries":["US"],"hiring_countries":[],"hiring_countries_total":0,"salary":null,"salary_estimate":{"min_usd":193000,"max_usd":350000,"period":"year","method":"role_seniority_country_remote_cell","sample_n":376},"experience_years_min":5,"visa_sponsorship":false,"relocation_package":false,"has_equity":false,"technologies":[{"name":"Claude Code","optional":false},{"name":"Machine Learning","optional":false},{"name":"Python","optional":false},{"name":"Agentic Workflows","optional":true}],"status":"live","first_seen_at":"2026-10-15T20:28:15Z","employer_posted_date":"2026-10-15","last_verified_at":"2026-10-16T13:07:52Z","board_verified":true,"closed_at":null,"days_open":0,"trust":{"level":"ok","repost_count":null,"flags":[],"days_open":0},"description":"About Cartography Biosciences\nCartography Biosciences is advancing a differentiated oncology pipeline of antibody-based therapies designed to target tumors with unprecedented precision. The company’s ATLAS and SUMMIT discovery platforms are powered by an industry-leading, fully integrated dataset spanning hundreds of thousands of cell states across healthy tissues alongside large-scale single-cell profiling of patient tumors. By combining petabyte-scale proprietary data, machine learning, and AI-driven biological insights, Cartography is identifying highly specific tumor targets and logic-gated target combinations to generate therapies engineered for maximal tumor selectivity and meaningful patient impact. The company’s lead program, CBI-1214, is a T-cell engager in development for colorectal cancer. CBI-1214 entered the clinic in early 2026 and is currently enrolling and treating patients in a phase 1 trial.\nAbout the Role\nWe are looking for a Principal Scientist or Associate Director to lead developability and protein sciences for our bispecific and multispecific antibody programs, including T-cell engagers. You will own the biophysical and developability screening that informs lead selection, along with the expression and purification that supplies it, working in house and with external partners. You will manage and grow a small team of scientists and play a leading role on cross-functional therapeutic program teams.\nThis is a hands-on, hybrid role based onsite in South San Francisco, with roughly half of your time at the bench alongside the team. You will turn developability data into program decisions and work with Antibody Engineering, Pharmacology, and program leadership to act on them. We expect the scope of the role to grow with the team and the pipeline.\nKey Responsibilities\nDevelopability & Biophysical Characterization\nDeliver developability and biophysical data for therapeutic programs as candidates advance from hit screening through lead optimization to development candidate nomination.\nOwn the developability screening cascade, including thermal stability (e.g. DSF, DSC), aggregation (e.g. analytical SEC), self-association (e.g. AC-SINS, DLS), charge variants (e.g. IEX, cIEF), hydrophobicity (e.g. HIC), polyspecificity (e.g. BVP ELISA, PSR), and molecular integrity (e.g. intact mass, CE-SDS).\nIntegrate in silico biophysical property assessment (e.g. sequence liabilities, surface patch analysis, aggregation propensity) with experimental data to prioritize and engineer candidates.\nCharacterize advanced leads and development candidates in depth through stress and forced degradation studies, PTM mapping (e.g. peptide mapping LC-MS), and early formulation development.\nHelp define and own the developability criteria at each program decision gate, and apply them consistently across programs.\nExpand the throughput, robustness, and technical scope of our protein analytics capabilities to support AI/ML-driven antibody engineering.\nProtein Expression & Purification\nOversee research-stage protein production from 1 mL to 10 L scale, in house and through external partners, run as a service with clear intake, prioritization, turnaround, and quality acceptance of incoming material.\nOptimize transient production of multi-chain bispecific and multispecific assemblies (knob-into-hole heterodimers, VHH-containing trispecifics), including plasmid chain-ratio tuning to maximize correctly assembled product.\nDirect purification strategies that resolve bispecific product-related species from the correctly paired heterodimer, using Protein A capture with ion exchange, hydrophobic interaction, mixed-mode, and preparative size-exclusion polishing.\nScale plate-based expression and purification, both in house and through external partners, to keep pace with screening throughput to support our AI/ML-driven antibody engineering platform.\nDeliver low-endotoxin, high-monomer material meeting in vivo dosing specifications for mouse pharmacology and non-GLP nonhuman primate (NHP) studies.\nProgram Leadership & Cross-Functional Work\nLead Protein Sciences work on cross-functional therapeutic program teams, bringing developability and manufacturability risk into design and advancement decisions and driving those decisions to closure.\nAs the portfolio grows, have the opportunity to lead cross-functional program teams, aligning Antibody Engineering, Pharmacology, and Computational Biology around program goals, timelines, and gate decisions.\nCommunicate data, risks, and recommendations clearly to program teams and leadership, and build alignment across functions on the decisions that follow.\nTeam Leadership\nManage, mentor, and develop scientists in protein purification and analytics, and set the day-to-day practices and priorities for the function.\nBuild data capture, analysis, and automation into the team's workflows, working closely with team members who develop internal software and AI tools.\nRequired Qualifications\nPhD in protein science, biochemistry, biophysics, chemical or biological engineering, or a related discipline with 5+ years (Principal Scientist) or 8+ years (Associate Director) of biopharmaceutical industry experience; or an MS with commensurate additional directly relevant experience.\nHands-on experience with bispecific or multispecific antibodies (e.g. knob-into-hole, common light chain, VHH / single-domain fusions), including analysis of product-related species.\nHands-on expertise with biophysical and developability methods, such as DSF or DSC, analytical SEC, IEX, HIC, CE-SDS, intact mass, self-association assays (e.g. AC-SINS), and polyspecificity assays (e.g. BVP ELISA, PSR).\nDevelopability triage experience in a research or discovery setting, translating biophysical data into candidate selection decisions.\nExperience with mammalian transient expression and multi-step antibody purification on FPLC systems (AKTA or equivalent), including Protein A capture and polishing by IEX, HIC, or mixed-mode chromatography.\nExperience serving as the protein sciences or developability expert on cross-functional therapeutic project teams, including developability data you presented that shaped a candidate selection or advancement decision.\nDemonstrated ability to lead cross-functional teams without direct authority, including setting priorities, running team meetings, and driving decisions to closure.\nExperience managing or mentoring scientists.\nHands-on experience writing code to analyze data or automate lab workflows (e.g. Python or R), including with AI coding assistants such as Claude Code.\nPreferred Qualifications\nExperience leading or co-leading a cross-functional therapeutic program team, or serving as deputy to a program lead.\nExperience using in silico tools to predict antibody developability and biophysical properties.\nExperience with PTM characterization by peptide mapping LC-MS and with stress and forced degradation studies.\nFormulation development experience, particularly high-concentration (greater than 100 mg/mL) formulations for subcutaneous dosing.\nExperience with liquid-handling automation and high-throughput purification and characterization.\nExperience managing outsourced protein production or characterization.\nKnowledge of T-cell engaging antibody platforms and a background in oncology or immuno-oncology.\nExperience building data pipelines, analysis tools, or agentic workflows with AI coding 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