Optics Engineer

Becoming•San Francisco, CA

About The Position

Becoming is building Developmental Intelligence: AI for predicting how organisms change over time. Most experimental systems fail when metabolic demands become too high. We are building systems that don’t — by combining engineered metabolic environments, sensing, control, and software into tightly integrated products that operate reliably over long time horizons. Hardware is core to our platform. It must work continuously, predictably, and under real biological constraints. We are hiring an Optics Engineer to architect and own optical subsystems within Becoming’s integrated hardware platform. This is a senior builder role. You will design stable, production-grade optical systems that integrate tightly with mechanical structures, electronics, firmware, and data systems — and you will be accountable for their real-world performance. This is not a research imaging role. You will think in terms of alignment stability, signal integrity, manufacturability, and long-duration runtime. You will define specifications, make architecture decisions, and own outcomes.

Requirements

Degree in optics, physics, electrical engineering, or equivalent demonstrated depth
Experience designing and shipping integrated optical systems
Strong first-principles understanding of optical design and detection physics
Experience integrating optics with mechanical and electrical platforms
Demonstrated ownership of systems operating under real-world constraints
Ability to operate without rigid process scaffolding or heavy vendor abstraction

Responsibilities

End-to-end ownership of optical subsystems inside complex hardware platforms
Optical path architecture: illumination, detection, filtering, and signal optimization
Component selection with attention to stability, lifecycle, and manufacturability
Mechanical integration and alignment strategy under thermal and environmental constraints
Electrical integration of detectors and signal acquisition systems
Signal-to-noise optimization and drift mitigation
Calibration frameworks and long-term stability validation
Prototyping, stress testing, and failure analysis
Documentation and standards that enable scaling