Principal Scientist, Biological Applications Bakar Bio Labs, Berkeley, CA, and Santa Cruz HQ In person, full time View role

Turn good biology into applications: protocols that make new models (disease models, brain regions and, in time, tissues beyond the brain) and assays that run on Habitat and our imaging. Design the chips and fixtures those applications need, support users on the biology, and share responsibility for cell culture with the Lab Director.

What you will do

• Build flagship assays: long-term potentiation, seizure response, media analysis and dose-response, standardized on Habitat.
• Take region-specific organoids and disease models from published methods to validated, automated programs, with the benchmarks that prove each one works.
• Translate bench protocols into Habitat protocols that agents can schedule, run and audit, and pair them with imaging.
• Design, print and test chips and fixtures in CAD against live biology.
• Back up the Lab Director on culture operations, and write the application notes and training our users rely on.

What you bring

• A PhD in bioengineering, neuroscience or stem cell biology.
• Assays or disease models built on iPSC-derived neural cultures or organoids, with functional and molecular readouts.
• Microfluidic, perfusion-based or automated culture, or MEA electrophysiology.
• CAD (Fusion 360 or SolidWorks) and 3D printing.
• Methods others reproduce and reports people act on.

Good to have

• Soft lithography, bonding and surface treatment
• MaxWell Biosystems, 3Brain or Axion platforms
• Cardiac, vascular or other non-neural tissue models
• Pharmacology, dose-response design or seizure liability assays

Base salary $155,000 to $185,000 a year, depending on experience. Equity, health benefits and flexible paid time off. Visa sponsorship is evaluated case by case; tell us your situation early.