At Lilly, we unite caring with discovery to make life better for people around the world. We are a global healthcare leader headquartered in Indianapolis, Indiana. Our 35,000 employees around the world work to discover and bring life-changing medicines to those who need them, improve the understanding and management of disease, and give back to our communities through philanthropy and volunteerism. We give our best effort to our work, and we put people first. We’re looking for people who are determined to make life better for people around the world.

The Discovery Chemistry Research and Technologies division of Eli Lilly and Company is seeking experienced Doctoral level Researchers with a strong background in Synthetic and Medicinal Chemistry and Drug Discovery, with excellent communication skills, and with the ability to work well in the Team Lilly environment. The selected candidate will play a major role in the development of one or more new modalities for therapeutic intervention (for example, protein degraders and antibody-drug conjugates) with exciting potential to deliver innovative agents for high conviction targets.

The successful applicant will:

• Always keep safety as your top priority, striving toward a proactive safety culture.
• Develop and advance new modality capabilities, including target protein degradation (TPD) and/or antibody-drug conjugates (e.g., small molecules, peptides and/or oligonucleotides).
• Leverage prior experience to establish new modality best practices.
• Help build internal expertise for linker and conjugation technology to support TPD and ADC efforts, staying abreast of developments in the field and formulating proposals to incorporate new capabilities and technologies.
• Augment internal expertise through external collaborations with leaders in TPD and ADC technology.
• Formulate hypotheses and design novel small molecules and conjugates to engage disease modifying targets and contribute to the advancement of drug discovery programs from early lead generation to early clinical translation.
• Leverage world-class structure-based drug design and computational capabilities to drive innovative molecular design and optimize potency, properties, and selectivity as well as ADME and safety profiles.
• Ability to effectively partner and leverage external CRO resources.
• Collaborate with colleagues specialized in high-throughput automated synthesis, route optimization and scale-up to drive compound design cycles and discovery timelines.
• Develop collaborative relationships with scientists in areas like pharmacology, translational science, ADME and toxicology, and Legal to address specific program needs, increase your overall business acumen and provide them with Medicinal Chemistry perspectives.

Basic Qualifications:

• PhD in Organic or Medicinal Chemistry with 5+ years demonstrated experience OR MS in Organic or Medicinal Chemistry with 10+ years demonstrated experience in supporting drug discovery.
• Demonstrable exposure to new modalities (e.g., Targeted protein degradation, antibody-drug conjugates including small molecules, peptides and/or oligonucleotides, etc.) or related discovery chemistry technologies is required.
• Consistent track record of delivering Medicinal Chemistry and new modalities innovation, ideally with 3+ years of experience in discovery and optimization of one or more of new modality agent classes.

Additional Skills/Preferences:

• Scientific creativity and ability to solve problems through careful experimental design, analysis of complex data sets and mechanistic insight.
• Track record of external scientific contributions including peer reviewed publications, presentations, and/or patents.
• Demonstrated dedication to mentoring and developing scientific staff.
• Scientific curiosity, bold vision, and outstanding work ethic.
• Medicinal Chemistry and new modality expertise in pharmaceutical, biotechnology, or academic environments, with demonstrated knowledge of the following domains of Drug Discovery will be highly valued:
• Lead optimization to improve properties of compounds, optimize in vitro and in vivo potency, selectivity, and ADMET properties.
• Contemporary understanding of ligand binding efficiency, energetics, and biophysical techniques such as X-ray protein structure, SPR, ASMS.
• Command of scientific informatics and data visualization tools (e.g. TIBCO Spotfire, KNIME) to undertake computationally enabled multi-property optimization approaches.
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills, ability to engage highly effectively as team player in a multidisciplinary and global environment.
• Excellent team player skills, strong attention to detail, strong problem-solving skills, a high level of learning agility, the ability to work across functions and within a global and matrixed organization.
• Examples of scientific creativity and ability to ideate independently and in teams solving problems through hypothesis-based experimental design, analysis and integration of complex data sets and mechanism of action insight.
• Candidate will understand the whole drug discovery process including lead generation, lead optimization, in vivo pharmacology, ADME, biopharmaceutical science, process development and preclinical safety assessment.
• Track record of creating and/or leading science and/or business projects and initiatives, coordinating multiple scientific and/or business activities and team members.

Eli Lilly and Company, Lilly USA, LLC and our wholly owned subsidiaries (collectively “Lilly”) are committed to help individuals with disabilities to participate in the workforce and ensure equal opportunity to compete for jobs. If you require an accommodation to submit a resume for positions at Lilly, please email Lilly Human Resources ( Lilly_Recruiting_Compliance@lists.lilly.com ) for further assistance. Please note This email address is intended for use only to request an accommodation as part of the application process. Any other correspondence will not receive a response.

Lilly is an EEO/Affirmative Action Employer and does not discriminate on the basis of age, race, color, religion, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, national origin, protected veteran status, disability or any other legally protected status.

Our employee resource groups (ERGs) offer strong support networks for their members and help our company develop talented individuals for future leadership roles. Our current groups include: Africa, Middle East, Central Asia Network, African American Network, Chinese Culture Network, Early Career Professionals, Japanese International Leadership Network (JILN), Lilly India Network, Organization of Latinos at Lilly, PRIDE (LGBTQ + Allies), Veterans Leadership Network, Women’s Network, Working and Living with Disabilities. Learn more about all of our groups.

As a condition of employment with Eli Lilly and Company and its subsidiaries in the United States and Puerto Rico, you must be fully COVID-19 vaccinated and provide proof of vaccination satisfactory to the company (subject to applicable law).

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