Automation Engineer

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Job description

Our mission is to make biology easier to engineer. Ginkgo is constructing, editing, and redesigning the living world in order to answer the globe's growing challenges in health, energy, food, materials, and more. Our bioengineers make use of an in-house automated foundry for designing and building new organisms. Today, our foundry is developing over 40 different organisms to make different products across multiple industries.We're looking for talented engineers who are excited by the challenges of scaling and improving our foundry. Because it touches nearly every part of the foundry, the Automation Team is integral to Ginkgo's vision for the future. The Automation Team is creating integrated robotic workcells, designing processes around walk-up robotic systems, improving how data is handled, working with scientists on scaling their processes, and much more. All the work we do is in service of increasing Ginkgo's capacity in terms of the number of strains engineered and the diversity of species and products we can handle. It's an enormous challenge and we need people who are eager to get started. You'll be working hand in hand with biologists, software developers, and other engineers to co-develop the wetware, hardware, and software infrastructure that underpin the foundry.To learn more about automation engineering at Ginkgo, take a look at this blog post: Day in the Life: Kristen.ResponsibilitiesDeveloping automated experimental workflows for genetic engineering processes, strain cultivation, sample preparation, and multi-omics analysisDevelop and code review software to drive operation of laboratory instruments and robotics including using best practices for developing and maintaining the codebaseWriting software for data acquisition, retrieval, and processingCollaborating with biologists on automation equipment operationDesigning and building integrated automation infrastructure, including work cells for executing high-throughput processes, as well as flexible distributed automation toolingTraining automation users on workflows and best practicesSupporting and maintaining automation hardwareValidating and QC'ing automated protocolsDesired Experience and CapabilitiesBS or MS in engineering or equivalentExperience with design of experiment (DoE)Experience with laboratory automation systems and experimental workflow developmentMade use of at least one major programming language, e.g. Python, C#, C/C++, or Java (Scala is a plus, familiarity with multiple is a plus), including using best practices for developing and maintaining the codebasePractical knowledge of high-throughput biological processesExperience in hardware development, integration, and testingTo learn more about Ginkgo, check out some recent press:What is it really like to take your company public via a SPAC? One Boston biotech shares its journey (Fortune)Ginkgo Bioworks resizes the definition of going big in biotech, raising $2.5B in a record SPAC deal that weighs in with a whopping $15B-plus valuation (Endpoints News)Ginkgo Bioworks CEO on scaling up Covid-19 testing: 'If we try, we can win' (CNBC)Ginkgo raises $70 million to ramp up COVID-19 testing for employers, universities (Boston Globe)Ginkgo Bioworks Redirects Its Biotech Platform to Coronavirus (Wall Street Journal)Ginkgo Bioworks Provides Support on Process Optimization to Moderna for COVID-19 Response (PRNewswire)The Life Factory: Synthetic Organisms From This $1.4 Billion Startup Will Revolutionize Manufacturing (Forbes)Synthetic Bio Pioneer Ginkgo Raises $290 Million in New Funding (Bloomberg)Ginkgo Bioworks raises $350 million fund for biotech spinouts (Reuters)Can This Company Convince You to Love GMOs? (The Atlantic)We also feel that it's important to point out the obvious here there's a serious lack of diversity in our industry, and that needs to change. Our goal is to help drive that change. Ginkgo is deeply committed to diversity, equity, and inclusion in all of its practices, especially when it comes to growing our team. Our culture promotes inclusion and embraces how rewarding it is to work with people from all walks of life.We're developing a powerful biological engineering platform, so we must remain mindful of the many ways our technology can and will impact people around the world. We care about how our platform is used, and having a diverse team to build it gives us the best chance that it's something we'll be proud of as it continues to grow. Therefore, it's critical that we incorporate the diverse voices and visions of all those who play a role in the future of biology.It is the policy of Ginkgo Bioworks to provide equal employment opportunities to all employees and employment applicants.Apply for this job