Formulation Chemist - Principal Scientist or Group Leader Marrone Organic Innovations

Marrone Bio Innovations is a venture capital-backed company in Davis, California, discovering and developing biopesticides for unmet pest and weed management needs in organic and conventional farming and water. We are currently looking for a PRINCIPAL SCIENTIST or GROUP LEADER to join our Process Development Department. He/she will be part of our team to establish and improve the formulation processes of our products, and develop new formulation processes for our new products.

Duties and Responsibilities

Designs, formulates, and develops formulation processes at lab and commercial scale and storage stable biopesticide products largely with use of natural product ingredients with recognized low toxicity and minimal environmental impacts for the agricultural and water markets.
Designs and conducts Stability Studies and Product Testing Procedures. Key evaluations include efficacy, microbial, pH, physical (viscosity, dispersion, particle size, emulsion/suspension, etc.), compatibility testing (container, tank mix, etc.), and ASTM methods.
Facilitates transition of experimental products to full commercial production such that cost, quantity and performance requirements are met.
Produces and tracks product for field trials, process development and scale-up.
Provide the sales and Field Development organization technical support for advances and selling products.
Responsible for strategic and scientific planning together with other product development functions in R&D and manufacturing to improve processes and solve problems.
Identifies and defines problems, proposes efficient plans to address these problems, and then lead the team to execute these plans.
Participates in technical transfer of formulation processes to contract manufacturing facilities, including site visits.
Provides ongoing analysis of competitor products.
Carries out discovery and evaluation of new or improved processes and ingredients, and identifies their benefits to a wide variety of formulations to create valuable intellectual property.
Stays current in the field of formulation to learn new techniques and methods in formulation development.
Represents company to suppliers and vendors on proposed formulations, designs, manufacturing processes, and procurement of necessary materials.
Assembles and maintains testing and formulation equipment.
Prepares laboratory notebooks, technical reports, summaries, protocols, and methods for the development of company?s biopesticide products.
Supervises a scientific group of 3-6 senior and junior chemists, and student interns.

Qualifications

Education

Ph.D. degree in Formulation Science, Pharmaceutical Science, Polymer Science, Colloid and Surface Science, Organic Chemistry or related field with a minimum of 10 years of relevant industrial work experience, and a minimum 5 years of supervisory experience in industry.

Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities

Desirable experience in development of bench scale and manufacturing scale agricultural or pharmaceutical formulations.
High level expertise in aqueous solution chemistry with complete knowledge of pH, buffers, rheology, and phase transitions.
Desirable experience with colloids, surface science, microbial derived-products, plant-derived products, biopesticides and dehydration technologies.
Experience in carrying out of the following procedures is desirable: rheometry, particle size analysis, gravimetric analysis, microscopy, sieving, blending/mixing, wet/dry milling, coating, extrusion, lyophilization, spray drying and drum drying.
Understands performance and ingredient requirements of regulated agricultural and household use pesticide products in North America and the European Community.
Must have expertise in regulations concerning product ingredients including US EPA, FDA, and USDA.
Experience in technical transfer of formulation process to contract manufacturing facilities.
Energetic and self-motivated individual able to work in a fast-paced team environment.
Self-directed and creative, and must able to work effectively in a flexible and agile team environment.
Strong communication and presentation skills; able to work effectively as part of a team.
Excellent analytical, organizational and multi-tasking skills.
Proficiency in writing technical reports.
Computer literacy, including Microsoft Office.

Location:	2121 Second Street B-107 Davis, CA 95618 United States