# Principal Scientist / Associate Director, Soft Materials Experimentation at Lila Sciences

- Company: Lila Sciences
- What the company does: LILA has created the world's first Operating System for Science powered by Scientific Superintelligence™. Backed by General Catalyst.
- Company website: https://www.lila.ai/
- Type: Startups (AI role)
- Level: Principal and up
- Location: Cambridge, MA USA
- Work setup: On-site
- Posted: 2026-09-24
- Apply by: 2026-11-08
- Apply: https://job-boards.greenhouse.io/lilasciences/jobs/4403708009
- Page: https://www.1752.vc/careers/jobs/lila-sciences-principal-scientist-associate-director-soft-materials-experimentat/

## About the role

Lila is hiring a Scientific Leader to build and run our experimental soft materials team, covering formulations, polymers, colloids, gels, emulsions, inks, adhesives, and coatings. You will take on a group of four scientists and grow it as the portfolio expands across formulation, rheological and scattering characterization, and polymer processing.

## What they're looking for

- PhD in Materials Science, Polymer Science, Chemical Engineering, or Chemistry with 8+ years of post-degree R&D experience, or equivalent depth built through industrial practice
- Experience leading scientific teams, whether as a formal manager or as a technical lead with direct responsibility for others' work
- Deep soft-matter fundamentals: phase behavior, self-assembly, rheology, interfacial phenomena, colloid and dispersion stability, transport, cure and crosslinking
- Hands-on record formulating and characterizing multicomponent systems and translating structure–property relationships into performance
- Demonstrated delivery against external milestones with industrial partners or sponsored programs
- Data-centric experimental practice: DoE, high-throughput methods, structured capture, and working with ML colleagues as a peer rather than a customer

Tags: Autonomous Science Platform