Associate Director​/Director, Protein Sciences

About Cartography Biosciences

Cartography 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.

We are looking for an Associate Director or Director of Protein Sciences to lead protein sciences and external manufacturing for our programs as they advance toward the clinic. You will be the technical lead for our CDMOs across process development, analytical development, and drug substance and drug product. You will also build and manage our research‑stage expression, purification, and analytical and develop ability capabilities in house and through external CROs.

This is a hands‑on, hybrid role based onsite in South San Francisco. You will work at the bench alongside associate scientists while also managing external manufacturing partners and CROs. The role balances hands‑on internal work with external program management, and we expect the scope to evolve as the team and Cartography’s CMC organization grow.

• Serve as the technical lead to our external manufacturing partners across cell line development, upstream and downstream process development, analytical method development, and GMP drug substance and drugproductfor gene to IND CMC programs
• Ensure external programs deliver drug product to specification, on time, and on budget.
• Communicate program progress, risks, and key decisions to the internal leadership team.
• Support ongoing process development for clinical stage programs, including early high‑concentration formulation development to enable subcutaneous dosing.
• Build recombinant antibody expression, in houseandthrough external CROs, spanning 96‑well / deep‑well high‑throughput transient screening and mL‑to‑L bench‑scale transient mammalian production (Expi
  293, ExpiCHO, transient CHO) to support research and in vivo studies (mouse efficacy / PK and non‑GLP NHP).
• Run the expression pipeline as an internal service with clear intake, prioritization, and turnaround, tracking titer,yield, and qualityin ELNentries andaLIMS‑backed registry.
• Optimize 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.
• Increase expression and screening throughput to support AI/ML‑driven design, build, and test cycles.
• Build antibody and bispecific purification trains:
  Protein A capture with orthogonal polishing by ion exchange, hydrophobic interaction, and mixed‑mode chromatography, plus analytical and preparative size‑exclusion.
• Develop format‑specific strategies that resolve bispecific product‑related species (heavy‑chain homodimer, half‑antibody, and light‑chain‑mispaired variants) from the correctly paired heterodimer.
• Operate AKTA‑scale chromatography and high‑throughput magnetic‑bead purification (King Fisher or equivalent) to support candidate triage and research supply.
• Deliver low‑endotoxin, high‑monomer, clinically representative material meeting in‑vivo dosing specifications for pharmacology and toxicology studies.

• Manage and improve internal develop ability and characterization capabilities (e.g.,analytical SEC, HIC, DSF, CE‑SDS (reduced and non‑reduced), and DLS).
• Confirm correct chain pairing and quantify product‑related species (homodimer,…