Company: DermBiont, Inc.
Location: Boston, MA
Job: Director of Skin Biology and Immunology
Schedule: Full-time
Employee Status: Regular
Organization:
DermBiont, Inc. is a clinical-stage biotechnology company developing breakthrough therapeutics that target skin disease at the root cause. DermBiont’s biotherapeutics have the potential to alter current paradigms for the diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of skin diseases. We evaluate the human microbiota for associations to disease markers while studying ex vivo and organotypic disease models for probiotic treatments.
We have live bacterial and small molecule products in development and, in addition, have pioneered a whole genome-based bioinformatics platform for the discovery of additional candidate live bacterial products. At DermBiont, you can expect to engage deeply in research, discovery, and clinical affairs. We are interested in developing solutions for skin conditions, and are taking multiple approaches to understanding the factors that contribute to healthy skin functioning. Employees will grow with a dynamic, rapidly expanding organization, and have an impact on patients’ lives.
We are building out a new division on skin biology and are looking for a leader to establish a team around skin models, microbiome science, immunology, microbiology, and virology. This is an opportunity to help set the strategic direction of a rapidly growing clinical microbiome company as we expand our technical assets and leverage new tools for testing the function of microbe-microbe and microbe-host interactions on patients health.
Key responsibilities:
● Build in house capabilities and lead a U.S. based team to enable the discovery and development of microbiome based products that treat or prevent diseases of the skin.
● This would include but not be limited using established methodologies and developing new methodologies for in-vitro, ex-vivo, and in vivo evaluation of products that modulate the innate and adaptive immune systems, epidermal barrier function, and UV induced cell damage.
● Work internally and externally to identify biological targets and technologies to provide skincare benefits.
● Have knowledge in skin biology and related sciences to assigned projects, ensure project design reviews, analyses, data summary and interpretation, and report and manuscript preparation.
● Interface throughout the organization, translate scientific and business needs into practical, biological, solutions.
● Mentor and grow team, while supporting a culture of continuous improvement.
● Develop departmental goals, KPIs, and plan for organizational growth.
● Lead and manage cross-functional R&D and Clinical projects and budgets
● Create skin biology internal capability for safety and efficacy studies of novel drug agents, formulation products, and disease indications
● Contribute to microbial assay development, validation, and automation to enable biosafety studies and high throughput screening of microbial candidates
● Lead internal QC effort of individual strains and clinical trial materials
● Communicate diagnostic results with management and executive team in a non-technical manner
● Coordinate with Clinical Team on skin microbiome sample collection, storage, and transportation
● Proactively consult primary scientific literature, keep current on state of art technologies and emerging concepts in molecular diagnostics related to dermatology
Qualifications:
● PhD or MD/PhD in a relevant scientific field such as skin biology and , immunology employing in-vitro, ex-vivo, and in-vivo methods.
● 8+ years of experience in biotech research, discovery or development with a substantial amount in skin biology
● 4+ years leading, coaching, and developing scientific teams
● Experience with Molecular Biology, Immunology and/or Microbiology
● Ability to multi-task in a fast-paced working environment
● Proven extensive technology and R&D planning and management experience is a must.
● Influences and communicates effectively with non-technical audiences including senior business executives and managers.
● A sharp thinker who quickly grasps the technical implications of business processes, and able to provide valuable insight into the perspectives of users, managers, developers, and other stakeholders
● Quickly and reasonably estimates capital, schedule, and human resources costs of proposed solutions. Compares, contrasts, and prioritizes among alternatives approaches while assessing risk both quantitatively and qualitatively
Strongly preferred:
● Microbiome research experience
Interested candidates please email resume to: recruiting@dermbiont.com