Scientist, Research Scientist, Clinical Research

Introduction

Xencor is a public, clinical‑stage biopharmaceutical company located in the Los Angeles area (Pasadena) and in San Diego. Our focus is developing high‑potential XmAb® bispecific T‑cell engagers and additional engineered drug candidates that leverage our differentiated technology platforms, and we are advancing our pipeline toward clinical proof‑of‑concept decisions. Our goal is to create high‑impact therapeutics for patients with cancer and other serious diseases.

More than 20 XmAb drug candidates engineered with our technology are in clinical development, and three XmAb medicines have been marketed by partners. We have an excellent opportunity for a Scientist 2 to join our team.

We are seeking a highly motivated and skilled individual to join our Antibody Discovery team. This open position is an exciting opportunity to impact the next wave of biologic candidates to enter our pipeline. The successful candidate should have general in vitro antibody display experience with special emphasis on yeast display. The ideal candidate will work to optimize a yeast‑display discovery platform and participate in antibody library design and construction.

The candidate will collaborate with scientists from different functional groups and conduct in vitro display campaigns to identify novel therapeutic hits and optimize leads against a wide range of targets and diseases. Candidates should have a demonstrated record of technical proficiency and ability to work effectively with a diverse group of researchers in a team environment.

• Perform yeast display‑based discovery screens to support new and ongoing therapeutic programs.
• Use NGS, including NGS library generation, QC, sequencing and data analysis, for hit selection.
• Execute display‑based lead optimization, including design and building of new display libraries, QC, and screening.
• Stay current with external advancements in relevant scientific fields and techniques.
• Evaluate scientific strategies, review data in real‑time and make the necessary experimental adjustments to ensure successful delivery of yeast display discovery campaigns.
• Coordinate research & development efforts with other departments to prioritize critical experiments for advancing discovery programs.
• Participate and present data in group and departmental meetings as needed.
• Follow all laboratory safety guidelines, practices and protocols.
• Contribute to the design and execution of experiments, analysis, interpretation of data, and reporting and archiving of results.
• Adhere to all department and company‑wide policies regarding conduct, performance and procedures.
• May provide direction to direct and indirect reports, as applicable, in accordance with the organization’s policies and procedures.
• Attend to daily laboratory operations including the maintenance of equipment, inventories, consumables, reagents, and other supplies.
• Perform other duties as required.

Position requires a Ph.D. in a relevant scientific field, with at least 3 years of post‑graduate laboratory work experience; previous industry experience is preferred. Requires prior experience collaborating on project teams matrixed across functions including contract laboratories and corporate partners and strong research study experience. Requires sound theoretical and experimental experience in a relevant scientific field coupled with technical proficiency, scientific creativity, collaboration with others and independent thought.

Small company and industry work experience preferred.

• Strong hands‑on experience with yeast display, including building naïve and/or immunized libraries.
• Experience with antibody lead optimization, including affinity, potency and develop ability enhancement.
• Expertise in molecular cloning and utilization of DNA analysis software (Geneious Prime, Se quencher or similar software).
• Experience in NGS technology, including NGS library generation, QC, sequencing and sequence analysis.
• Experience with AI / ML sequence analysis would be helpful.
• Strong understanding of antibody structure, function, and engineering.
• Experience with high throughput screening…