Nucleic Acids Specialist - UBC, Vancouver

Your impact

As a Nucleic Acids Specialist within the Advanced Therapeutics Manufacturing Facility (ATMF) at UBC, you will play a senior technical role in developing, executing, troubleshooting, and evaluating molecular biology and nucleic-acid manufacturing processes, with a particular focus on plasmid DNA and RNA therapeutics. Your work directly contributes to building a Good Manufacturing Practice biomanufacturing core facility to produce advanced therapeutics like cells, mRNA vaccines, viral vectors, and ancillary plasmid DNA for early-phase clinical trials and pandemic preparedness.

• Designs and evaluates plasmid DNA constructs for use in IVT, viral vector production, and other advanced therapeutic applications.
• Applies advanced knowledge of molecular biology to construct design, including selection and optimization of promoters, untranslated regions, coding sequences, poly(A) elements, restriction sites, and regulatory elements.
• Reviews DNA and RNA sequences for design errors, sequence integrity, manufacturability, and compatibility with downstream applications before experimental work is initiated.
• Designs cloning strategies and performs or oversees molecular cloning, plasmid modification, sequence verification, and characterization of plasmid constructs.
• Develops and troubleshoots molecular biology workflows using techniques such as PCR, qPCR/ddPCR, restriction digestion, gel or capillary electrophoresis, DNA/RNA purification, and sequencing.
• Develops and optimizes processes for production and purification of plasmid DNA suitable for downstream manufacturing applications, including IVT and viral vector production.
• Develops, optimizes, and scales IVT processes for production of mRNA and other RNA products.
• Develops and evaluates analytical methods for characterization of plasmid DNA, IVT templates, RNA intermediates, and final RNA products.
• Supports development of lipid nanoparticle formulation processes for encapsulation and delivery of RNA products where applicable.
• Maintains detailed and accurate experimental records documenting process parameters, materials, results, deviations, troubleshooting, and conclusions.

About the company

The University of British Columbia is a global centre for research and teaching, consistently ranked among the top 20 public universities in the world. UBC encourages its students, staff, and faculty to challenge convention, lead discovery, and explore new ways of learning. The Advanced Therapeutics Manufacturing Facility is a new CFI-funded project and part of Canada's Immuno-Engineering and Biomanufacturing Hub, a UBC-led national research hub aligning immune-engineering with biomanufacturing and public health strengths in British Columbia.