Automation Engineer

LLNL•Livermore, CA

3d•Onsite

About The Position

We have an opening for an exceptional Automation Engineer to join a multi-disciplinary team in supporting leading edge research and development in metal additive manufacturing. The successful candidate will be self-motivated to collaborate with staff engineers and scientists to develop various automated systems and protocols to enhance the liquid metal jetting droplet-on-demand technology. The Automation Engineer will help develop real-time printing diagnostics with active feedback control and create a framework for automated experiments and data processing to increase throughput of empirical studies on jetting performance. This position is in the Materials Engineering Division (MED) of the Engineering Directorate. This position requires full-time on-site presence due to the nature of the work.

Requirements

Ability to secure and maintain a U.S. DOE Q-level security clearance which requires U.S. citizenship.
Bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering, physics, or a related field, or equivalent combination of education and related experience.
Experience working independently with proactive communication, in a hands-on experimental environment.
Fundamental knowledge of, and experience with, laboratory instrumentation such as oscilloscopes, power supplies, network analyzers, waveform generators and electrical diagnostics.
Experience in developing real-time diagnostics for additive manufacturing processes using machine vision.
Fundamental knowledge of optical imaging systems and high-speed videography.
Fundamental knowledge of, and experience with, engineering software tools (PSPICE or similar, Altium PCB layout tools or similar) to design circuits and scientific computing languages (Python, MATLAB, C/C++ or similar) to process data and create graphical user interfaces.
Aptitude for (and interest in) learning new fields of engineering and physics.
Self-motivated with ability to effectively handle multiple tasks, projects, and priorities.
Ability to travel as necessary to fulfill project and program responsibilities.
Sufficient verbal and written communication skills necessary to effectively collaborate, present, and explain technical information in a multi-disciplinary team environment.

Nice To Haves

Experience in developing real-time diagnostics for ink jetting and/or liquid metal jetting droplet-on-demand additive manufacturing.
Experience in building automated platforms using active control feedback between sensors and actuators using custom software.
FPGA and/or microcontroller programming experience.
Experience in 3D CAD design, such as SolidWorks or similar.
Experience using visual programming languages such as LabVIEW.
Experience evaluating and troubleshooting microfluidics systems.

Responsibilities

Develop real-time diagnostics on liquid metal jetting droplet-on-demand additive manufacturing platforms and other droplet-based platforms under general direction.
Manually evaluate jetting performance of different printhead configurations via experimentation to develop a fully automated platform to evaluate performance with minimal user interaction.
Fully automate analysis of various data modalities to extract printhead performance metrics using programming environments like Matlab or Python.
Summarize and communicate findings to staff engineers and scientists.
Work cooperatively within a multi-disciplinary team to contribute to the fulfillment of program objectives.
Perform other duties as assigned.