Senior Medicinal Chemist

GDIT is seeking a Senior Medicinal Chemist to support WRAIR’s ET program. The mission of the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research (WRAIR) Branch of Experimental Therapeutics (ET) is to discover and develop new therapeutic agents to protect military members from death, disease, and injury.

The Branch is the nation’s primary developer of new drugs to prevent and/or treat malaria and leishmaniasis. Collectively, ET engages in drug discovery, drug efficacy and mechanism evaluation, and formal preclinical and clinical development for antiviral, antiparasitic, and antibacterial compounds. WRAIR ET focuses on the discovery and development of novel therapeutics to combat or otherwise treat specific biological and/or environmental threats to the warfighter.  

This is carried out through the integration of modern drug design and classical medicinal chemistry, and includes global surveillance of drug resistance, investigation of drug efficacy, toxicity, and pharmacokinetics/pharmacodynamics through in vitro and in vivo testing. Additionally they plan, coordinate, and execute basic and advanced research into the design, synthesis and development of novel chemical entities to inhibit, combat or otherwise treat specific biological and/or environmental threats to the warfighter.

Responsibilities:

• Provide medicinal chemistry subject matter expertise to support drug discovery and development efforts in ET/WRAIR
• Coordinate with multidisciplinary teams to integrate and apply medicinal chemistry techniques to drug discovery, drug advancement, and study design of research programs in ET.
• Provide strategic advice to Branch and Center leadership based on extensive pharmaceutical industry experience for the identification, characterization, and development of new drugs to protect the Warfighter.
• Elucidate structure activity relationships using multi-parameter analysis
• Design compounds for drug development projects based on chemical series structure activity relationships and/or literature precedence.
• Prioritize compounds for in vitro and in vivo biological and ADME assessment.
• Possess thorough understanding of relevant animal models of efficacy and toxicity, and actively contribute to study design and dosing regimen.
• Produce effective reports and presentations to communicate experimental progress and results for internal and external purposes.
• Submit invention disclosures/patent applications and/or peer-reviewed scientific publications
• Actively seek and author/coauthor research proposals, solicitations, and other vehicles to solicit financial support to meet ET/WRAIR mission/portfolio needs.
• Identify, foster, and manage internal and external collaborations with other government agencies, non-profits, academics, and private-sector research organizations and companies in order to establish and maintain a pipeline of therapeutic drugs
• Meet  on  a  weekly  basis  with  key  administrative  and  technical  staff  to  set performance tasks, report progress, and troubleshoot technical issues

WHAT YOU’LL NEED:

Qualifications:

• Ph.D. in organic chemistry, medicinal chemistry, or related discipline with experience working in the pharmaceutical industry.
• 10 years of drug development project management experience with medicinal chemistry expertise leading multiple projects from hit to lead stage to near pre-clinical development. The contractor shall have experience working for a government agency, preferably DoD or pharmaceutical industry.
• Expert working knowledge of organic and medicinal chemistry. Provide thorough understanding of pharmacokinetics, pharmacology, toxicology, drug design, use of in silico tools, ability to interpret in vivo results, drug discovery process, purification techniques, and ability to analyze target compound spectra obtained by analytical instruments to characterize compounds such as nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR), infrared spectrometry (IR), mass spectrometry (MS), and elemental analysis.
• Able to use Microsoft Office programs including Word, Excel, PowerPoint, ChemDraw and should be familiar with SAR vision, Vortex, or some other suitable chemical mapping/analysis software programs. Experience publishing scientific papers in a peer reviewed recognized medicinal/ chemistry journals and/or patents and/or submitting pre-proposals and/or proposals for internal or external funding.
• Mentor synthetic chemists and provide written feedback for annual performance reviews of synthetic chemists.
• Work may involve long periods of standing.
• Office environment; may require working evenings and weekends.
• Must be a US citizen with the ability to obtain a favorable NACI T1 security investigation.

WHAT GDIT CAN OFFER YOU: 

• Challenging work that makes a real impact on the world around you  
• Internal mobility team dedicated to helping you own your career 
• 401K with company match 
• Diverse, highly collaborative teams
• Professional development, education assistance, certification and training opportunities