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Anthrogen is engineering post-modality biology, developing AI systems that design modular biological machines and the experimental infrastructure to instantiate them. The company is a small, high-density team in San Francisco focused on frontier AI and biological validation.
As a Research Scientist on the Platform Science team, you will own experimental research on how designed proteins and assemblies behave—their function, interactions, and failure modes. You'll develop assays, choose what to measure, and follow results far enough to understand them deeply. Platform Science is not a validation queue; you'll help decide which biological problems the company tackles and what evidence constitutes progress.
Key responsibilities:
- Drive experimental research from initial question through assay design, execution, analysis, and the next design decision
- Build quantitative biochemical and functional assays for designed proteins and assemblies, including experiments in relevant cellular contexts
- Distinguish real biological activity from assay artifacts through appropriate controls and independent measurements
- Work closely with ML researchers to turn successes and failures into useful constraints for next-generation designs
- Develop reliable methods across constructs, targets, and repeated experiments; help colleagues use them effectively
You should have a track record of original experimental research and be able to explain what you personally figured out—whether through strong publications, difficult discovery programs, or methods other scientists rely on. Deep hands-on expertise in protein biochemistry, molecular biology, cell biology, or a closely related field is essential, with fundamentals to work beyond your specialty. You can build and troubleshoot assays, reason quantitatively about their limitations, and recognize when clean-looking results are misleading. You drive research direction independently while staying close to the bench, document work reproducibly, and are curious, high-agency, and willing to change your mind when experiments disagree with you.
Bonus experience includes characterizing engineered proteins or complex protein systems, investigating protein function and mechanism in cellular systems, connecting structural or biophysical measurements to function, and Python or R for analysis or experience with high-throughput experimentation and lab automation.
Full-time, onsite in San Francisco. Equity: 0.05–0.5%.
