Editor’s note: Each Wednesday, WRAL TechWire features a story highlighting life science jobs across North Carolina and the NC Bio Jobs Hub initiative from the North Carolina Biotechnology Center.

DURHAM – Soon you might run into it anywhere around the Triangle:

“Me? Oh, I just started working at the GRAIL plant in RTP.”

“Somehow I never pictured you working in manufacturing.”

“Um…we make cancer detection kits. Really special kits. They could save your life. Or mine. So yes. It’s great. This is manufacturing work like none other.”

GRAIL, an innovative California healthcare company, announced last June that it would invest $103 million and create nearly 400 new jobs over four years in a new 200,000-square-foot lab, office, and warehouse facility in Research Triangle Park.

Then three months after the RTP announcement, San Diego-based Illumina, which founded GRAIL in 2016 and then spun it off as a standalone business, reentered the picture. Illumina bought GRAIL back for $8 billion. And the RTP project remained a “go.”

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GRAIL, founded in Menlo Park with a mission “to detect cancer early, when it can be cured,” had raised more than $2 billion in venture capital to support its development of a “liquid biopsy” blood test to detect cancers in people, even before they develop symptoms.

The company is using the power of next-generation genetic sequencing, population-scale clinical studies, and state-of-the-art computer science and data science for Galleri, its multi-cancer early detection test. An earlier version of Galleri demonstrated the ability to detect more than 50 types of cancers — over 45 of which lack recommended screening tests today — with a low false-positive rate of less than 1%. When cancer is detected, Galleri localizes the cancer signal from a single blood draw.

Now, GRAIL is hiring as the RTP site prepares for a virtual open house on Tuesday, April 27, from noon to 1 p.m. The company is opening the RTP site to some of its new employees now, with plans to begin laboratory operations there this fall.

The Zoom virtual open house is open to anyone who registers. It will open with an introduction from North Carolina Biotechnology Center President and CEO Doug Edgeton, followed by opening remarks from the Durham County Board of Commissioners Chair Brenda Howerton.

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Andrew Crenshaw, GRAIL vice president of lab ops and the RTP site lead, will then unveil a video tour of the facility and Richmond, Va., oncologist Andrew Poklepovic, M.D., will provide the insights of a key opinion leader on GRAIL’s Galleri test platform.

GRAIL is actively hiring laboratory scientists and technologists; equipment, quality, and automation engineers; and supply chain and warehouse personnel. The company encourages candidates to visit www.grail.com/careers to view and apply for open positions with Janice Leung and Jen Montalvo.