Researcher in Autonomous Vehicle Perception

Nissan Motor Corporation • Santa Clara, CA

1d • Onsite

About The Position

We’re currently looking for a Researcher in Autonomous Vehicle Perception to join our team in Santa Clara, CA. As Perception Researcher, you will work with appropriate training datasets, select and train advanced networks for road user detection and/or road structure estimation, and will evaluate your work both offline in simulation and online in real-world testing. As a member of the Autonomous Systems team, you will get to research and develop perception algorithms that scale from simple scenes to complex intersections thereby ensuring predictable, safe, and human-like autonomous vehicle behavior.

Requirements

• Master’s in CS, EE, ME, Applied Mathematics, or a related field required. PhD in similar filed is preferred.
• Minimum of 3 years of professional hands on exp or pfieldoc research experience in autonomous vehicles required.
• Strong understanding of BEV encoders, LSS transforms, Sparse Instance-based Modeling, Spatial-Temporal Transformers, Deformable Attention, and/or Reasoning Backbones.
• Expert-level knowledge of C++, Python, PyTorch, TensorFlow, TensorRT.

Responsibilities

• Lead the architectural design of perception and road structure estimation algorithms, ensuring they are well-positioned within the current academic and industry landscape.
• Take full initiative for research roadmaps, from initial literature review and "SOTA" innovation to final real-world vehicle deployment.
• Deliver complex, high-expertise work on-time, ensuring results are reusable by other researchers and provide an immediate foundation for future autonomy stacks.
• Formulate research problems with well-thought-out solutions, utilizing latest sensors and compute hardware to perform systematic evaluations.
• Operate with high autonomy, establishing strong cross-functional connections within the SV office and broader global teams.
• Present high-level research findings and roadmaps to internal Tech Talks, management and executives.
• Ability to translate internal breakthroughs into external-facing value through patents, conference tech reports, and peer-reviewed papers.
• Drive alignment through legible, valuable bi-weekly updates and sprint planning.

Benefits

• Career Growth and Continuous Learning Opportunities: Benefit from diverse career paths, cross-departmental moves, and innovative learning platforms. Enhance your skills through seminars, leadership training, and tuition reimbursement programs, all while playing a vital role in shaping the future of transportation. From day one, you'll have the support to tackle challenges and contribute to impactful solutions across our organization.
• Be supported with a Comprehensive Benefits Package, including medical, mental health, parental leave, retirement savings & unique Nissan perks, including discounts on lease vehicles as part of our Employee Lease Program and a Vehicle Purchase Program (VPP).

What This Job Offers

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