Optical Scientist

SETI Institute • Mountain View, CA

18h • $85,000 - $110,000 • Hybrid

About The Position

The NASA Ames Exoplanet Technology Group is looking for candidates with bold and innovative ideas to develop unique solutions to challenging problems and to contribute to NASA’s future missions to directly image and spectrally characterize exoplanets. These missions include the Roman space telescope flagship (specifically, the coronagraphic instrument), and the Habitable Worlds Observatory (HWO) flagship. As part of this work, there will be potential opportunities for participation on NASA’s Great Observatory Maturation Program (GOMAP) for the HWO, as well as planning, conducting, and proposing for astronomical observations, including supporting a contributed mode for the Roman coronagraphic instrument. The optical scientist will primarily support the NASA Ames Exoplanet Technologies group’s Multi-Star Wavefront Control (MSWC) Project. In addition to supporting MSWC, the optical scientist will have the opportunity to support other projects at approximately 25% of their time. The position is primarily on-site at NASA Ames Research Center in Mountain View, CA, with some flexibility for hybrid work. The successful applicant should have a strong interest in the responsibilities listed in the next section, as well as experience in areas related to at least some of these responsibilities.

Requirements

• MS or PhD in Optical Science, Astronomy, Electrical Engineering, Physics, or related field.
• 1-4 years of experience in setting up and conducting experiments in optical laboratories (including MS/PhD work).
• Experience with optical modeling, wavefront control, and astronomy.
• Experience coding in python, MATLAB, and/or other scientific programming languages.
• Must be a US Person as defined under the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) (22 CFR § 120.62), as an individual who is a lawful U.S. citizen, a lawful permanent resident (Green Card holder), or a protected individual, such as a refugee or asylee. This is required for this role to enable the employee to access ITAR-restricted information.
• Experience in working in a team environment, ability to work synergistically in collaboration with other researchers/scientists.
• Excellent communications skills.

Nice To Haves

• Experience in high-contrast imaging / coronagraph laboratories is a significant plus.
• Experience with exoplanet science, especially around binary stars is a plus.
• Experience with Ansys Zemax OpticStudio is a plus.
• Experience with instruments and/or missions that have flown is a significant plus.

Responsibilities

• Innovate and invent techniques to improve performance and/or accelerate the maturation of high contrast imaging technologies. Initially, this will focus on the currently funded MSWC project, but the successful applicant will have opportunities to contribute to other projects (e.g., PIAA-Vortex, AstroPIC photonic integrated circuits) and is expected to invent new ones in the longer term.
• Computational modeling of instruments and missions (preferably in Python, MATLAB, and/or other scientific programming languages), including optical modeling, wavefront control, and expected science.
• Design and conduct laboratory experiments to characterize the performance of high-contrast imaging systems and components, including throughput, aberration sensitivity, and contrast, both on in-air and vacuum testbeds.
• Write and contribute to scientific papers.
• Present results at scientific workshops and conferences.
• Write and contribute to grant proposals.

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Mid Level