The Rosalind Franklin Institute (the Franklin) is a national research institute, funded by the UK government through UK Research and Innovation, dedicated to bringing about transformative changes in life science through interdisciplinary research and technology in the physical science. As a technical specialist within the Next Generation Chemistry theme of the Franklin, you will help establish, maintain and develop the underpinning analytical infrastructure and instrumentation that is essential to all the work in the Theme with a particular emphasis on NMR. You will contribute and advise on diverse scientific projects, training researchers in the use of equipment, contributing to data analysis, and overseeing equipment operation and maintenance.

Our ongoing expansion in this area also offers significant opportunities for independent research, including the possibility of a role as an independent group leader under our Franklin Investigator programme.

A primary task will be managing NMR spectrometers. Your role will entail establishing effective NMR and MS methods for small and large molecule characterization and mechanism, amongst others, and establishing and exploiting the joint use of NMR, MS and other biophysical methods for characterization of biomolecules and of ligand-biomolecule interactions.

You will also work with key partners in this area such as those in our High-Throughput Discovery team, Diamond's XChem team, as well as diverse academic and industrial partners as well as other complementary facilities on the Harwell Campus and partner institutions/universities.

Your remit will expand along with the Institute's activity and equipment, to support all work in synthetic, medicinal and chemical biology including our broad ambitions for diverse NMR applications in Phase 2 of the Franklin, especially those associated with pathology.

Accordingly, your tasks will increasingly encompass diverse methods and novel equipment in collaboration with our dedicated technicians.

You will have freedom to explore diverse research areas and will have the opportunity to work with diverse groups in the Franklin, including, in particular, the NMR Director for the Franklin, Andrew Baldwin. In this context you will latitude to explore joint links with external university partners, obtain on-going training and you will be encouraged to both lead and support research.

Responsibilities

You will:

• Ensure maximum uptime of all analytical equipment in your remit (especially NMR), by ensuring you are fully trained, implementing and following maintenance schedules, troubleshooting and fixing problems either directly or via vendors, maintaining spares and stocks, and related duties.
• Take responsibility for health and safety, working with local SHE advisers, ensuring that work in the infrastructures and laboratories is conducted safely and in accordance with HSE statutory, regulatory and institute regulations, incorporating changes in safety legislation as relevant.
• Ensure all equipment in your remit consistently performs optimally, by developing and executing calibration protocols and schedules.
• Develop and implement standard operating procedures for all routine experiments required by the scientific projects in the Institute, to simplify access for non-expert scientists.
• Where appropriate provide training or access to training for hands-on users (or 'super-user') from Franklin groups. It is envisaged that a community of pro-active users will lead to the maximum usage times.
• Organise and manage access to maximise productivity of the relevant research projects of the user community at the Franklin and on the Harwell Campus. This will involve consideration of schedules of access outside of typical working hours.
• Manage interaction with vendors, including training, service contracts, coordinating repairs, arranging for stocks and spares, and any other related tasks you identify.
• Manage interactions with relevant services accessed at partner institutions in this area, where these seem appropriate, relevant and/or complementary.
• Coordinate the Franklin activity relevant to this activity with partners, especially Diamond and the Research Complex at Harwell.
• Contribute to the public engagement in science programme of the Franklin and partners.
• Any other duties that come up in the normal running of the facility and that can be reasonably requested of the post-holder.

Selection criteria

Essential

• A relevant PhD qualification (or close to completion), or equivalent experience, in analytical/physical chemistry or biomolecular science
• Demonstrated ability to implement and use of various multinuclear 1D and 2D NMR methods for structure elucidation of molecules
• Experience with biomolecule (e.g. protein) NMR methods (e.g. NOESY) and characterisation of biomolecule-ligand complexes
• Experience with analytical sample preparation laboratory features, such as hazardous chemicals, specialist gases, cryogens, fume hoods, glove boxes, centrifuges, vacuum equipment, and microscopes
• Experience with data interpretation and analysis with emphasis on spectral pre-processing, statistical analysis and molecular structure elucidation
• Experience in training and/or conveying key skills
• Experience with HSE legislation, risk assessments and COSHH
• Experience with IT maintenance
• Ability to document experiments and protocols thoroughly and concisely
• Ability to co-ordinate multiple aspects of work in order to meet deadlines
• Ability to work as part of a team as well as independently
• Ability to solve problems independently using innovative and flexible thinking
• Excellent organisational and communication skills
• Ability to travel occasionally for training or dissemination of your work

Desirable

• Experience of NMR and MS maintenance and troubleshooting
• Practical experience with mass spectrometric instrumentation including chromatography, LC-MS and MS-based structure elucidation
• Experience with general laboratory equipment maintenance
• Experience with biophysical techniques such as SPR, ITC, fluorescence, etc.
• Experience with general lab management
• Experience with electronic record keeping
• Experience with electronic data and database management
• Basic programming and scripting skills in Python or C++, especially those of relevance to the operating systems of NMR and MS machines
• Experience of working in an industry or other operational settings

In return we offer:

• 25 days holidays
• Generous pension scheme (employer’s contribution currently up to 18%)
• Training and development opportunities for staff at all levels
• Bus pass discount scheme
• Access to employee discount platform
• Subsidised canteen
• Free on-site parking
• Campus location in beautiful countryside with social and sports clubs open to staff

Before submitting your application please ensure you read the Job Information Pack for full details of this role by clicking on the attachment at the bottom of this page.

About us: The Rosalind Franklin Institute is a national Research Centre, funded by the UK government through UK Research and Innovation, dedicated to bringing about transformative changes in life science through interdisciplinary research and technology. 

Location: The Franklin is based in Harwell Campus, UK’s innovation hub and well-established as one of the leading science and innovation campuses in Europe.   

Closing date: Monday 6th March 2023.

Interviews will be held on Wednesday 29th March 2023.

At the Rosalind Franklin Institute we welcome applications from all around the world!

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