Postdoctoral Scientist - Neurodegeneration

At Lilly, the work is demanding because patients are waiting. We unite caring with discovery to help make life better for people around the world, knowing that every decision, every detail, and every day matters. Headquartered in Indianapolis, Indiana, our over 50,000 employees around the globe take on complex challenges to discover and deliver life‑changing medicines, strengthen how health is understood and managed, and support the communities we serve.

This is hard, urgent, selfless work—but it’s work worth doing. If you’re driven by purpose and ready to bring your best to work that truly matters for patients, we invite you to join us.

Job Title:

Postdoctoral Scientist — Neurodegeneration

Lilly Neuroscience NGTx is a pre‑clinical development team based at the Seaport Innovation Center in Boston alongside Lilly’s Boston Neurodegeneration group. The team develops and applies human iPSC‑derived in vitro platforms to evaluate compound safety, potency, and efficacy across CNS therapeutic modalities. These platforms are a critical node in Lilly’s neuroscience pre‑clinical pipeline, supporting high‑priority programs targeting amyloid‑forming proteins across Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, and other neurodegenerative conditions.

This postdoctoral position will extend the established tri‑culture system into disease‑relevant pathological contexts, creating a pharmacologically responsive platform for compound assessment in neurodegeneration.

The postdoctoral researcher will lead establishment of amyloid‑forming protein pathology models in a human iPSC‑derived tri‑culture system (neurons, astrocytes, microglia). They will also apply those disease‑context models to assess therapeutic compound behavior across Lilly’s neuroscience modalities. Specific responsibilities include:

• Establish seed and preformed fibril (PFF)‑based pathology models in the iPSC tri‑culture system for multiple amyloid‑forming proteins, characterizing seeding efficiency, aggregate formation, and timing parameters for each.
• Perform systematic mono‑vs. co‑vs. tri‑culture comparisons to quantify the multicellular gain in neurotoxicity and neuroinflammatory responses across culture configurations.
• Characterize microglial activation and cytokine release profiles (multiplex MSD cytokine profiling) and neurotoxicity in response to pathological insults.
• Execute a systematic species‑ranking study comparing aggregate forms of amyloid‑forming proteins (monomers, oligomers, and fibrillar preparations) for neurotoxic and neuroinflammatory potency in the human multicellular context.
• Evaluate publishable tool compounds (siRNAs, antibodies) and internal proprietary compounds for potency, cellular uptake, and safety in healthy vs. pathological tri‑culture.
• Generate paired healthy vs. disease‑context datasets to directly compare compound behavior, providing decision‑support data for LRL neurodegeneration programs.
• Publish as first author and present findings at internal and external forums.

• PhD in Neuroscience, Cell Biology, Molecular Biology, or a closely related field.
• Demonstrated hands‑on experience with iPSC culture and/or primary neuron culture systems.
• Prior experience with in vitro neurodegenerative disease modeling, including PFF seeding, protein aggregation assays, or amyloid‑forming protein biology.
• Qualified applicants must be authorized to work in the United States on a full‑time basis. Lilly will not provide support for or sponsor work authorization or visas for this role, including but not limited to F‑1 CPT, F‑1 OPT, F‑1 STEM OPT, J‑1, H‑1B, TN, O‑1, E‑3, H‑1B1, or L‑1.

• Experience with neuronal co‑ or tri‑culture systems incorporating glia…