AbbVie Posted November 10, 2026

Senior Scientist II, Rheumatology

Cambridge, MA Full-time
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AbbVie is the source of truth for this posting and owns the application process. We surface normalized context and market comparison you won't find on the original listing.

About this opportunity

Company Description

About AbbVie

AbbVie's mission is to discover and deliver innovative medicines and solutions that solve serious health issues today and address the medical challenges of tomorrow. We strive to have a remarkable impact on people's lives across several key therapeutic areas including immunology, oncology and neuroscience - and products and services in our Allergan Aesthetics portfolio. For more information about AbbVie, please visit us at  www.abbvie.com . Follow @abbvie on  LinkedIn,   Facebook ,  Instagram ,  X  and  YouTube.

Job Description

Bring your scientific expertise to AbbVie and help drive the next wave of discovery in rheumatology. Join the Rheumatology team at the Cambridge Research Center as a Senior Scientist II within Discovery Immunology R&D. You will help shape preclinical drug discovery programs through target validation, mechanism-of-action studies, and translational research, connecting scientific insight with the development of potential new therapies.

Bring your expertise in immunology and inflammation biology, hands-on preclinical pharmacology experience, and in vivo model development skills to challenging questions in autoimmune disease. You will connect human disease biology with preclinical approaches and generate high-quality data packages that inform program decisions. Your scientific insight and experimental rigor will help advance differentiated therapeutic programs across the Immunology portfolio.

Key responsibilities include:

Lead a team of scientists to generate high-quality data packages that support drug candidate advancement from lead optimization through IND filing.

Drive in vitro and in vivo pharmacology for drug candidates, including establishing PK/PD relationships, developing and optimizing screening assays, designing and executing mechanism-of-action studies, and evaluating candidate efficacy.

Develop acute and/or chronic murine models of inflammation relevant to rheumatological diseases, including RA, PsA, and SLE, to support preclinical candidate development.

Apply immunological techniques such as flow cytometry, PCR/gene expression analysis, protein and cytokine quantification, histopathology, and other relevant functional readouts.

Design experiments, analyze data, and present findings at AbbVie scientific forums and external conferences.

Author and review technical reports, protocols, and other key scientific documents.

Bring your pharmacology expertise to pipeline programs as a functional representative, contributing to target evaluation, mechanism-of-action (MoA) studies, and model development.

Adhere to corporate standards related to code of conduct, documentation, safety, proper handling of materials, and humane treatment of laboratory animals.

Qualifications

Bachelor’s Degree or equivalent education and typically, 12 years of experience, Master’s Degree or equivalent education and typically 10 years of experience, PhD and typically 4 years of experience.​

Experience managing research associates preferred.

Proven expertise in in vitro and preclinical in vivo model systems, with hands-on experience in preclinical pharmacology and in vivo model development.

Excellent interpersonal, communication, and collaboration skills

Ability to work effectively in a highly collaborative environment, including cross-functional teams and colleagues across multiple locations to support team and company goals.

Key Leadership Competencies:

Build strong relationships with peers and cross functionally with partners outside of the immediate team to enable higher performance.

Learns fast, grasps the “essence” and can change course quickly as needed.

Creates a learning environment, open to suggestions and experiments to drive science in the field of interest.

Embraces the ideas of others, nurtures innovation and manages innovation to reality.

Additional Information

Applicable only to applicants applying to a position in any location with pay disclosure requirements under state or local law: ​

The compensation range described below is the range of possible base pay compensation that the Company believes in good faith it will pay for this role at the time of this posting based on the job grade for this position. Individual compensation paid within this range will depend on many factors including geographic location, and we may ultimately pay more or less than the posted range. This range may be modified in the future. ​

We offer a comprehensive package of benefits including paid time off (vacation, holidays, sick), medical/dental/vision insurance and 401(k) to eligible employees.​

This job is eligible to participate in our long-term incentive programs.

Note: No amount of pay is considered to be wages or compensation until such amount is earned, vested, and determinable. The amount and availability of any bonus, commission, incentive, benefits, or any other form of compensation and benefits that are allocable to a particular employee remains in the Company's sole and absolute discretion unless and until paid and may be modified at the Company’s sole and absolute discretion, consistent with applicable law.

AbbVie is an equal opportunity employer and is committed to operating with integrity, driving innovation, transforming lives and serving our community.  Equal Opportunity Employer/Veterans/Disabled.

US & Puerto Rico only - to learn more, visit  https://www.abbvie.com/join-us/equal-employment-opportunity-employer.html

US & Puerto Rico applicants seeking a reasonable accommodation, click here to learn more:

https://www.abbvie.com/join-us/reasonable-accommodations.html

Job details

Seniority
Senior
Function
Drug Discovery & Preclinical Research
Therapeutic area
Not listed
Location
Cambridge, MA
Employment type
Full-time

How this role compares

Computed from every other active Drug Discovery & Preclinical Research role in our database, not just this employer's listings.

We currently track 390 comparable Senior Drug Discovery & Preclinical Research roles across 55 biopharma companies.

390Comparable roles tracked
364Currently active
55Companies hiring similar roles
21Countries represented

Salary context

176 of 390 peers report a salary range (USD, annualized)

Peers share this role's job function and a matching or adjacent seniority level -- not necessarily the same therapeutic area or country.

This roleSubject $109,500/yr – $208,500/yr
Lowest disclosed · Senior Primate Behavior Specialist · Labcorp $70,000/yr – $80,000/yr
Highest disclosed · Toxicology Senior Research Fellow · Vertex Pharmaceuticals Inc (US) $232,000/yr – $348,000/yr
Peer group range $75,000 – $290,000 (median $160,413)

Where these roles are based

Top locations among the 390 comparable roles

United States298
China14
India13
United Kingdom10
Switzerland8
Germany7

+ 15 more countries

Seniority mix

390 of 390 peers have a known seniority level

Senior213
Principal146
Associate Director31

Therapeutic area mix

37 of 390 peers have a known therapeutic area; the rest are genuinely unlabeled, not hidden

Oncology15
Immunology10
Neuroscience8
Cardiovascular / CVRM3
Vaccines & Infectious Disease1

Similar opportunities

The closest matches from our peer group, ranked by how similar they are, not how well you'd qualify for them -- treat this as market context, not a guaranteed shortlist; a weak match is labeled as one below.

60%similar
Pharmacia & Upjohn Company Groton, United States Senior
Same function Same seniority Same country
60%similar
Pharmacia & Upjohn Company Groton, United States Senior
Same function Same seniority Same country
60%similar
AbbVie North Chicago, IL Senior
Same function Same seniority Same country
60%similar
Gilead Sciences, Inc. Foster City, United States Senior
Same function Same seniority Same country
60%similar
Gilead Sciences, Inc. Foster City, United States Senior
Same function Same seniority Same country
60%similar
Amgen Inc. Thousand Oaks, United States Senior
Same function Same seniority Same country

Notify me about similar jobs

Get an email when we spot other openings like this one – same job function, comparable seniority, roles you'd actually want to see.

Or follow a whole field: get every new Drug Discovery & Preclinical Research job in the United States, and choose locations and companies.

How we calculate "similar"

No black box, no LLM guesswork: a deterministic score built from four normalized attributes. Here's this role's own peer group at different match levels, so you can see the mechanism, not just the result.

Every comparison starts from the same 100-point budget: 25 for working in the same function, 40 for the same therapeutic area, 20 for the same or adjacent seniority, 15 for the same country. A dimension we can't confirm on both sides contributes nothing, never a guess, never a free pass.

60%
Senior Scientist Mass Spectrometrist
Pharmacia & Upjohn Company · Groton, United States · Senior
Function Therapeutic area Seniority Country
60%
Sr. Associate Scientist
Gilead Sciences, Inc. · Foster City, United States · Senior
Function Therapeutic area Seniority Country
60%
Senior Associate Scientist, RNA Therapeutics
Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, Inc (USA) · Tarrytown, United States · Senior
Function Therapeutic area Seniority Country
60%
Senior Toxicologist
Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, Inc (USA) · Cambridge, United States · Senior
Function Therapeutic area Seniority Country
Unmatched or unknown dimensions score exactly the same: 0 points, never a partial guess. A role we know almost nothing about beyond its function bottoms out at 25%; it never inflates to 100% just because there's little to compare against. Seniority uses a defined ladder (Associate → Manager → Associate Director → Senior → Principal → Director → Senior Director → Executive/VP) so "Director" and "Senior Director" count as adjacent, but "Director" and "Executive/VP" do not.