Senior Research Associate, Viral Production (Fixed-Term Contract)

The role

This person will produce lentivirus to supply high-quality viral preps for perturbation screening and cell engineering efforts. They will plan production rounds, scale cell expansions, maintain reagent stocks, and document and QC each lot.

What you will do

• Execute staggered rounds of lentivirus production using suspension and/or adherent systems
• Concentrate, filter, and aliquot virus into single-use aliquots
• Perform quality control on each lot including functional titration
• Coordinate cross-functionally to forecast demand and scale production
• Maintain organized documentation of production runs and inventory in Benchling
• Perform troubleshooting on failed productions
• Maintain inventory of key reagents, media, and consumables
• Help establish and refine an end-to-end viral production platform
• Contribute to process optimization for scale, quality, and consistency

Required qualifications

• BS degree in relevant field with 4+ years of relevant experience, or MS degree in relevant field with 2+ years of relevant postgraduate experience
• Proficiency in mammalian cell culture procedures and associated aseptic techniques
• Direct hands-on experience producing lentivirus at scale using suspension (e.g., LV-MAX) and/or adherent systems
• Demonstrated ability to execute reproducible, multi-step production protocols consistently
• Experience with viral titration and QC methods
• Experience with filtering, single-use aliquoting, cryopreservation, and inventory management of viral stocks
• Meticulous documentation and record-keeping
• Strong organizational, planning, and time-management skills
• Familiarity with reagent inventory, operations management, and LIMS/ELN platforms (e.g., Benchling)
• Excellent communication skills

Nice to have

• Industry or core-facility experience in viral production
• Experience developing or leveraging automation for viral production and/or titration at scale
• Prior experience independently optimizing processes and workflows to improve viral yield, quality, and consistency
• Hands-on experience with multiple viral production systems and protocols, including AAV production
• Experience producing lentivirus in arrayed (plate-based) formats as well as large-scale pooled-library formats
• Experience managing external vendor relationships for cloning and plasmid preps

Before you apply

• This role is not eligible for visa sponsorship

About the company

Arc Institute is an independent nonprofit research organization at the interface of artificial intelligence and biology. It is based in Palo Alto and partners with Stanford University, UC Berkeley, and UC San Francisco.