Working at MIT offers opportunities, an environment, a culture – and benefits – that just aren’t found together anywhere else. If you’re curious, motivated, want to be part of a unique community, and help shape the future – then take a look at this opportunity.

POSTDOCTORAL ASSOCIATE, Kavli Institute for Astrophysics and Space Research-Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory (LIGO), to join a team designing and delivering the low latency alerting system to be used for rapid gravitational wave detection and follow-up during LIGO's (and Virgo's) fourth observing run, expected to commence in late 2021. The LIGO Laboratory--operated by the California Institute of Technology and MIT--is an NSF major facility dedicated to observing the newly discovered gravitational-wave universe. Will work on the design, implementation, and maintenance of low-latency astrophysical searches and distribution of the source detections as public alerts to the broader astronomical community. Such public alerts have enabled the follow-up of the astrophysical sources detected by LIGO and Virgo in the electromagnetic spectrum as well as with neutrinos. With the increased sensitivity expected for the international network of detectors, analyses and alerts will have to deliver a wealth of astrophysical detections in real time. The LIGO Laboratory is collaborating on these aspects with and working as part of the broader LIGO Scientific Collaboration (LSC) and international network of interferometric gravitational-wave detectors (Virgo, KAGRA). 

Job Requirements

REQUIRED:  Ph.D. in physics, astronomy, or computer science; familiarity/experience with signal processing techniques in extracting weak signals out of noise and with cloud-based technologies for deployment and management of scientific software; and ability to come up-to-speed with modern technologies in real-time applications like the analysis and dissemination of gravitational wave alerts, including workflows for distributed data analyses tasks, queuing, and pub/sub technologies. LIGO’s low-latency alert system is currently undergoing a design study and review and the ability to benchmark such technologies for the specific application and participate in and lead such efforts is expected.  Job #19091