Principal Scientist – Multiscale Separations Team Lead
Merck
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Job summary
Merck in Rahway, NJ seeks a Principal Scientist to lead Separations Sciences within the Analytical Enabling Capabilities Organization. You will guide purification and analytical activities supporting the development pipeline and partner across functions to advance drug candidates.
The role requires extensive chromatography experience (HPLC, uHPLC, LCMS, SFC), strong leadership, and a track record delivering scalable purification solutions, mentoring staff, and driving safety, quality, and
Qualifications
- Extensive experience in chromatographic purification and analytical separations for drug development.
- Hands-on experience delivering purification across scales from micro to kg.
- Experience with multiple modalities including small molecules and biologics is a plus.
- Demonstrated leadership and ability to influence technical direction in a lab setting.
- Experience implementing new technologies, informatics platforms, and digital workflows.
Responsibilities
- Provide scientific leadership in purification and analytical strategies supporting development programs.
- Partner with cross-functional teams to drive capability development and process improvements.
- Mentor scientists and staff; foster a culture of safety, quality, and collaboration.
- Lead laboratory operations, automation initiatives, and capital planning.
- Engage with external collaborators and CDMOs to advance purification capabilities.
Skills
Education
Tools
Job description
We are seeking a Principal Scientist to join our Separations Sciences team, within the Analytical Enabling Capabilities Organization, located in Rahway, New Jersey.
Scientific Leadership and Laboratory Delivery
- Serve as a recognized subject matter expert in purification and separation sciences, providing scientific leadership and contributing to purification and analytical activities that enable the development pipeline.
- Provide technical leadership and expertise in chromatographic purification, analytical separations, impurity isolation, and related technologies, while guiding resolution of complex scientific and operational challenges.
- Foster a culture of scientific excellence, operational efficiency, safety, and quality throughout laboratory operations.
Capability Development and Innovation
- Partner with DSCS digital technologies (DDT) to drive and implement innovative technologies, laboratory informatics platforms, automation-enabled purification workflows, and digital capabilities that enhance the effectiveness, efficiency, and impact of Separation Sciences capabilities.
- Establish best practices, drive continuous improvement initiatives, and contribute to capability roadmaps aligned with CMC needs.
Talent development and Mentorship
- Partner with the Director of Separation Sciences to identify, recruit, mentor, and develop scientists and laboratory staff, building both technical expertise and leadership capability across the organization.
- Foster a collaborative, inclusive, and high-performing environment that supports employee development, succession planning, and scientific excellence.
Cross-Functional Collaboration and Influence
- Partner closely with key partners in Process Chemistry, Pharmaceutical Analytical Sciences, Automation, Informatics, IT, and other research functions to support project progression and capability development.
- Serve as a trusted scientific partner to project teams, contributing purification and analytical expertise to project strategy and departmental initiatives.
Operations and Infrastructure Leadership
- Partner in laboratory operations, instrumentation strategy, capital planning, and implementation of automation and digital solutions that improve scientific productivity.
- Partner with Facilities, Procurement, Engineering, IT, and external vendors to ensure reliable laboratory operations, regulatory compliance, and continuous capability advancement.
External Scientific Engagement
- Maintain awareness of emerging technologies and scientific advances in separation sciences and chromatography, contributing to our company's scientific reputation through publications, presentations, collaborations, and external engagement.
- Ph.D. in Chemistry, Analytical Chemistry, Pharmaceutical Sciences, Chemical Engineering, or a related scientific discipline with a minimum of 8 years of relevant industrial experience in pharmaceutical, biotechnology, or related drug development and research environment.
- M.S. in Chemistry, Analytical Chemistry, Pharmaceutical Sciences, Chemical Engineering, or a related scientific discipline with 10-12 years of relevant industrial experience in a pharmaceutical, biotechnology, or related drug discovery research environment.
- Extensive experience in chromatographic purification and analytical separations supporting drug development programs, with expertise in HPLC, uHPLC, LCMS, SFC, and preparative chromatography technologies.
- Working knowledge of orthogonal detection technologies, including PDA, Multi-angle light scattering, charged aerosol detection etc.
- Demonstrated hands-on experience delivering purification solutions across a broad range of scales (µg to kg), enabling seamless translation from early-stage experimentation through larger-scale execution.
- Demonstrated experience supporting multiple therapeutic modalities, including small molecules, peptides, adjuvants, and other emerging modalities.
- Demonstrated ability to provide scientific leadership, influence technical direction, and deliver results through a laboratory-based scientific capability, including scientific leadership in chromatography, separation sciences, analytical chemistry.
- Experience implementing new technologies, laboratory informatics platforms, LIMS solutions, automation-enabled purification workflows, digital workflows, instrumentation, and process improvements.
- Experience mentoring, and developing scientific staff, with strong communication, collaboration, and organizational skills.
- Demonstrated commitment to safety, quality, and operational excellence.
- Track record of cross-functional and cross-site scientific leadership, capability deployment, technology transfer, and successful collaboration across purification networks including internal and external CDMOs, scientific disciplines, and research organizations.
- Experience in mass spectrometry and its application in MS-directed chromatographic purification.
- Experience partnering with IT, Informatics, Automation, Facilities, Procurement, and external vendors to develop and advance scientific capabilities.
- Experience with laboratory capital planning, laboratory build-out, infrastructure strategy, or management of scientific instrumentation portfolios.
- Publications, presentations, patents, or other evidence of external scientific engagement and professional visibility.
- Pharmaceutical cGMP experience is a plus.
- Analytical Method Development
- Assay Development
- Bioanalytical Analysis
- Chromatographic Techniques
- Clinical Judgment
- Cross-Functional Teamwork
- Dosage Forms
- Ethical Compliance
- Liquid Chromatography (LC)
- Matrix Management
- Mentoring Staff
- Method Validation
- Personal Initiative
- Stability Testing
- Technical Writing
Our company is committed to inclusion, ensuring that candidates can engage in a hiring process that exhibits their true capabilities.
Regular
Domestic/International
Yes
10%
Not Applicable
Not Indicated
No
n/a
10/30/2026
- A job posting is effective until 11:59:59PM on the day BEFORE the listed job posting end date. Please ensure you apply to a job posting no later than the day BEFORE the job posting end date.
R420285
The salary range for this role is
$156,900.00 - $247,000.00
This is the lowest to highest salary we in good faith believe we would pay for this role at the time of this posting. An employee’s position within the salary range will be based on several factors including, but not limited to relevant education, qualifications, certifications, experience, skills, geographic location, government requirements, and business or organizational needs.
The successful candidate will be eligible for annual bonus and long-term incentive, if applicable.
We offer a comprehensive package of benefits. Available benefits include medical, dental, vision healthcare and other insurance benefits (for employee and family), retirement benefits, including 401(k), paid holidays, vacation, and compassionate and sick days. More information about benefits is available at https://jobs.merck.com/us/en/compensation-and-benefits.
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