Hardware Engineer, Precision Instrumentation

Astera Institute•Emerybille, CA

18d

About The Position

Astera Neuro is building a founding team to understand and engineer consciousness through large-scale neural recording, causal perturbation, and brain-based AI. The team aims to develop technologies for writing experience directly into the brain and tools with potential therapeutic applications for neurological and psychiatric diseases. Its work is high-risk, high-reward, collaborative, and shared openly under Astera's Open Science Policy. The Hardware Engineer will design, build, and iterate physical systems for experiments, many of which are not commercially available. Working directly with scientists, the engineer will take projects from detailed plans or early ideas through design, fabrication, integration, and reliable operation. Projects may span mechanical design, fabrication, electronics, and optics. The engineer will also help establish the team's design and prototyping facility, including its tooling, workflows, and fabrication capabilities.

Requirements

Bachelor's degree or equivalent experience in mechanical, electrical, or biomedical engineering, physics, or a related field.
Track record of building precision hardware in a high-precision industry, such as medical devices, robotics, aerospace, semiconductor capital equipment, or commercial scientific instrumentation.
Experience designing and building hardware that others relied on for real work, and keeping it running.
Ability to get hardware built quickly using appropriate methods, including machining, 3D printing, or outsourcing.
Comfort working from rough ideas and collaborating with users to develop a working instrument.
Strong fundamentals in mechanical design and fabrication, with practical ability in electronics or optics.
Track record of owning complex instruments end-to-end, from concept through fabrication and integration to reliable operation.
Experience making and defending design tradeoffs across performance, manufacturability, cost, and timeline.
Experience equipping and running a workshop, makerspace, or prototyping facility.
Intellectual curiosity, collaborative instincts, and eagerness to learn the science around the role.

Nice To Haves

Experience with small precise parts, difficult materials, tight tolerances, precision motion, or optical alignment.
Hands-on electronics design experience, including PCB layout, embedded systems, or sensor/actuator integration.
Familiarity with electrophysiology or other low-volume, high-complexity hardware environments.
CAD/CAM proficiency and hands-on machining experience with CNC equipment, lathes, or mills, as well as 3D printing.
Experience integrating hardware with data acquisition systems, including DAQ, TTL synchronization, or serial/SPI protocols.

Responsibilities

Design precision mechanical systems for experiments, including titanium microfixtures, micrometer-precision electrode drives, and custom machined jigs.
Build components for custom microscopes and optical systems, including alignment and mounting hardware.
Design and iterate custom laboratory instrumentation and surgical or experimental robotics in collaboration with scientists.
Develop electronics and control hardware that connect mechanical systems with data acquisition and the broader research stack.
Help build the design and prototyping facility, including its tooling, workflows, and fabrication capabilities.
Take hardware projects from concept or plan through fabrication, integration, iteration, and reliable operation.
Make and defend design tradeoffs involving performance, manufacturability, cost, and timeline.