Research Assistant in Biocatalysis
- Employer
- KINGS COLLEGE LONDON
- Location
- London (Central), London (Greater)
- Salary
- £38,232 per annum, including London Weighting Allowance
- Closing date
- 28 Nov 2025
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- Job Type
- Research Related, Research Assistants / Officers
- Contract Type
- Fixed Term
- Hours
- Full Time
Job Details
About us
The selected candidate will join Dr. Godwin Aleku's research team at the Institute of Pharmaceutical Science, part of the School of Cancer and Pharmaceutical Sciences at King’s College London. Dr. Aleku’s biocatalysis and enzyme engineering group focuses on creating sustainable, enzyme-based methods for pharmaceutical synthesis and exploring the role of biocatalysis in drug discovery.
The Institute of Pharmaceutical Science (IPS) at King’s College London is renowned for its achievements in chemical biology and medicinal chemistry, with many successful projects advancing from the lab to clinical application. IPS offers a cutting-edge research environment that fosters interdisciplinary collaboration across chemical biology, medicinal chemistry, biosciences, and pharmaceutical sciences.
About the role
We are seeking to hire a Research Assistant in biocatalysis for an EPSRC-funded project focused on developing enzymatic CO2-fixing enzymes to support sustainable pharmaceutical synthesis. The successful candidate will be involved in cloning, expressing, and biochemically characterising a wide range of biocatalysts for use in organic synthesis. Candidates should hold a degree or Master's in Chemistry, Chemical Biology, or Biochemistry, with demonstrated experience in working with enzymes, enzyme expression, and characterisation, as well as analytical techniques for monitoring enzymatic reactions.
This is a full time post (35 hours per week), and you will be offered a fixed term contract for 12 months until 28th February 2026.
About you
To be successful in this role, we are looking for candidates to have the following skills and experience:
Essential criteria
- A degree in Chemistry/Chemical Biology/Biochemistry or a related subject with at least six months of wet lab experience.
- Experience with molecular biology.
- Experience with enzyme expression and characterisation.
- Experience with analytical chemistry and spectroscopic techniques for monitoring reactions e.g. UV/Vis absorbance/fluorescence, HPLC/LCMS and GC/GCMS, NMR.
- Ability to work collaboratively within a team and to work independently, with minimal supervision.
- Desirable criteria
- A Master's degree in Chemistry/Chemical Biology/Biochemistry or a related subject with at least six months wet lab experience
- Experience in Enzyme Engineering
Downloading a copy of our Job Description
Full details of the role and the skills, knowledge and experience required can be found in the Job Description document, provided at the bottom of the next page after you click “Apply Now”. This document will provide information of what criteria will be assessed at each stage of the recruitment process.
Further information
This post is subject to Occupational Health clearances.
We pride ourselves on being inclusive and welcoming. We embrace diversity and want everyone to feel that they belong and are connected to others in our community. We are committed to working with our staff and unions on these and other issues, to continue to support our people and to develop a diverse and inclusive culture at King's.
We ask all candidates to submit a copy of their CV, and a supporting statement, detailing how they meet the essential criteria listed in the advert. If we receive a strong field of candidates, we may use the desirable criteria to choose our final shortlist, so please include your evidence against these where possible.
To find out how our managers will review your application, please take a look at our ‘ How we Recruit’ pages.
Interviews are due to be held on in Early January 2025.
We are unable to offer sponsorship for candidates who do not currently possess the right to work in the UK.
Company
King's College London is one of the top 20 universities in the world and among the oldest in England. King's has more than 27,600 students (of whom nearly 10,500 are graduate students) from some 150 countries worldwide, and some 6,800 staff.
King's has an outstanding reputation for world-class teaching and cutting-edge research. In the 2014 Research Excellence Framework (REF) King’s was ranked 6th nationally in the ‘power’ ranking, which takes into account both the quality and quantity of research activity, and 7th for quality according to Times Higher Education rankings. Eighty-four per cent of research at King’s was deemed ‘world-leading’ or ‘internationally excellent’ (3* and 4*). The university is in the top seven UK universities for research earnings and has an overall annual income of more than £684 million.
King's has a particularly distinguished reputation in the humanities, law, the sciences (including a wide range of health areas such as psychiatry, medicine, nursing and dentistry) and social sciences including international affairs. It has played a major role in many of the advances that have shaped modern life, such as the discovery of the structure of DNA and research that led to the development of radio, television, mobile phones and radar.
King's College London and Guy's and St Thomas', King's College Hospital and South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trusts are part of King's Health Partners. King's Health Partners Academic Health Sciences Centre (AHSC) is a pioneering global collaboration between one of the world's leading research-led universities and three of London's most successful NHS Foundation Trusts, including leading teaching hospitals and comprehensive mental health services. For more information, visit: www.kingshealthpartners.org.
King’s £600 million campaign, World questions|KING’s answers, has delivered huge global impact in areas where King’s has particular expertise. Philanthropic support has funded new research to save young lives at Evelina London Children’s Hospital; established the King’s Dickson Poon School of Law as a worldwide leader in transnational law; built a new Cancer Centre at Guy’s Hospital; allowed unique collaboration between leading neuroscientists to fast-track new treatments for Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, motor neurone disease, depression and schizophrenia at the new Maurice Wohl Clinical Neuroscience Institute; created the Cicely Saunders Institute: the first academic institution in the world dedicated to palliative care, and supported the King’s Sierra Leone Partnership in the Ebola crisis. Donations provide over 300 of the most promising students with scholarships and bursaries each year. More information about the campaign is available at www.kcl.ac.uk/kingsanswers.
- Mini-site
- KINGS COLLEGE LONDON
- Telephone
- +(44)02078365454
- Location
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