WE ARE LOOKING FOR YOU!

Location: Leiden (office) and Schipluiden (farm) and working from home - Netherlands

Type: Full-time

RespectFarms is a start-up in the cellular agriculture industry, located in the Netherlands. With a long history in cultivated meat, our vision is to sustainably transform our food system by integrating the best out of the conventional and the cellular agriculture industry. We, therefore, see ourselves as system integrator. We will optimize, productize and commercialize the first cultivated meat farm by 2030, with 1000 more farms to come by 2038.

Our approach focuses decentralized (scale-out) production, modular bioprocess systems, farmer-operated facilities, automation-first design, and practical deployment in real agricultural environments.

We aim to redesign the meat supply chain so that farmers stay economically relevant, food production becomes more sustainable and meat production happens closer to consumers.

We are looking for a Researcher Cellfeed who is passionate about food innovation and eager to contribute to the future of cultivated meat by developing and optimizing cellfeed for the expansion and differentiation of animal cells with a specific focus on circularity.

We are seeking an enthusiastic, highly motivated and talented Researcher Cellfeed to join our team. The successful candidate will improve cell growth, productivity, and product quality while reducing cellfeed costs to enable scalable commercial manufacturing. Cellfeed or media development is one of the most critical challenges in cultivated meat because it strongly influences cell performance, production cost, and food safety. The candidate will specifically focus on making the media more circular by e.g. looking for media ingredients from local sources.

Unlike centralized biotech factories, with RespectFarms farmers become operators of advanced cellular agriculture technology. This requires practical engineering, user-friendly operation, and automation-driven process design. You will work at the integration of animal cell culture, cell culture media development, bioprocess engineering, automation, and agricultural operations.

In the role of Researcher Cellfeed, you will spend a large proportion of your time handson developing and optimizing cost effective circular cell culture media, but also managing external collaborations on this topic. You will design robust SOPs for the preparation of formulations of cell culture media that come out of the experimental work and work closely together with a small team to incorporate your findings in the mammalian cell culture process from lab to modular farming level we are setting up.

We are looking for a Researcher Cellfeed to develop and optimize our cell culture media fundamental in growing cells and realizing our first pilotfarm. Part of your role is making this plan a reality, scaling out our technology to the world! Qualifications needed for this role:

• BSc with 2-5 years of experience, MSc with 0-2 years of experience in Cell Biology, Biotechnology, Bioprocess Engineering, Biochemical Engineering, or related field.
• Strong experience with cell culture media design and formulation is essential
• Strong experience with animal cell culture is a must have
• Knowledge and expertise on Design of Experiments (DoE) is nice to have
• Understanding of bioreactors and the effect of cell culture media in fed-batch and perfusion processes is good to have
• Document experimental results and prepare technical reports, SOPs, and regulatory documentation
• Food-tech or cultivated meat experience is good to have
• Knowledge of Agricultural technology and its waste streams is helpful

Please apply for this position with your CV and motivation letter.