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Job Summary

Caltech Optical Observatories (COO) is seeking a talented software engineer with significant systems engineering experience to join its Optical and Infrared (OIR) Instrumentation group. The OIR group designs, fabricates, and commissions advanced astronomical instrumentation for Palomar, Keck, Thirty Meter Telescope and other leading observatories. This position is based at the Caltech university campus in Pasadena, California, but requires occasional travel to Palomar Mountain, California and Mauna Kea, Hawaii.

Job Duties

• Technical leadership of software engineering teams developing embedded instrument and supervisory software for Caltech’s instrumentation program
• Management of software development efforts, including customer interface, requirements engineering, configuration management, unit and regression testing, deployment, and on-going maintenance
• Deliver control systems for $40M-class astronomical instruments
• Systems engineering support through all phases of development from conceptual design to commissioning instruments on telescopes, including quality assurance, assembly, integration and test procedures, software verification, and requirements compliance

Basic Qualifications

• M.S. degree in Mechanical Engineering or equivalent and 16+ years experience, including demonstrated individual delivery of major software projects
• Strong written and oral communications and organizational skills
• Fluency with modern software development processes, including effective leadership of small software teams
• Mastery of systems engineering processes, including requirements capture, flow-down and error budget development, quality assurance, and commissioning planning and execution
• Demonstrated success in a fast-paced, diverse multidisciplinary research environment, including ability to meet strict deadlines
• Independent initiative to develop astronomical systems solutions responsive to faculty needs
• Demonstrated ability to work effectively with domain experts to deliver complex optical, mechanical, and electrical subsystems
• Occasional travel and work assignments at high altitudes, occasionally in limited light environments, requires DMV check and successful pre-employment physical including vision screening

Preferred Qualifications

• M.S. degree plus 20+ years experience with software development
• Experience with formal requirements engineering practices for large science projects, fluency with DOORS
• Proven publication record of independent work in engineering or scientific journals, or through awarded patents

Required Documents

• Resume
• CV
• Cover Letter