Senior Scientist / Investigator

Discuva Ltd is a subsidiary of Summit Therapeutics (www.summittxinc.com). This is a full-time role based at our R&D facilities in Cambridge, UK.

Our Mission:
To build a viable long-lasting health care organization that assumes full responsibility for designing, developing, trial enrolment, regulatory approval and commercializing patient, physician, caregiver, payor, and societal friendly medicinal therapy intended to improve quality of life, increase potential duration of life, and resolve serious medical healthcare needs. To identify and control promising product candidates based on exceptional scientific development and administrational expertise, develop our products in a rapid, cost-efficient manner and to pursue commercialization and/or development partners when and where appropriate. Our initial area of accomplishment is to be infectious disease and specifically Clostridioides difficile (‘C diff').

We will accomplish this by building a team of world class scientists and business administrators that apply themselves to this mission. Team Summit exists to strategize and execute a path forward in medicinal therapeutic health care that places us in a top market share leadership position. Team Summit assumes responsibility for stimulating continuous expansion of knowledge, ability, capability, and wealth for all involved stakeholders.

Ridinilazole:
Ridinilazole is our lead antibiotic, to treat Clostridioides difficile (‘C. diff') infection which is in Phase 3 trials. Our longer-term goal is to build a franchise in the field of infectious diseases through the discovery and development of new mechanism of action antibiotics focused on treating patients with serious bacterial infections where there is a substantial unmet need and where we believe we can show meaningful advances over current treatments. Our focus is on developing patient-friendly medicines that are sympathetic to the hosts microbiome.

Overview of Role:
We require an experienced and enthusiastic scientist to join our research team to work within a vibrant and stimulating scientific environment. The role is anticipated to be predominantly laboratory-based with some project management elements to maximise impact on, and progression of, existing and emerging drug discovery projects.

Role and Responsibilities:
• Design, optimisation, and execution of experiments, adhering to protocols and analysing resultant data within agreed timelines.
• Scope new approaches and methodologies to compliment and extend our in-house capabilities and to fully support projects
• Provide detailed research reports for projects, external briefing documents and publications
• Communicate results in a timely manner with clarity and precision, both verbally and in writing
• Maintain detailed records of high quality, reproducible experiments and results
• Facilitate problem-solving, contingency planning, and decision-making

Experience, Education and Specialized Knowledge and Skills:

Required:
• Degree, MSc, PhD or equivalent in Biology, Microbiology, Biochemistry, or related discipline
• A diligent researcher, with strong technical skills and demonstrable application to antibiotic discovery, microbiome research or microbiology research.
• Excellent analytical thinking and problem-solving skills
• Strong communication (verbal and written) and influencing skills
• Good information management and collaboration skills
• Exceptional interpersonal skills with the ability to work individually, within a multi-disciplinary team, as well as with external partners and regulators
• Understands the dynamic and requirements of working in a small company
• A track record of delivering to deadlines

Desired:
• Experience in performing and analysing NGS workflows.
• Experience in drug discovery in the biotechnology/pharmaceutical sector.