Data Scientist 4 - Robotics

About the Role

Key Responsibilities

• Lead and support scientific research in robotics, autonomous systems, and intelligent control within the Data Sciences and Machine Intelligence group.
• Contribute to the development of intelligent, integrated robotic platforms for scientific applications such as autonomous laboratories.
• Develop and apply advanced algorithms for motion planning, learning-enabled control, and autonomous decision-making using techniques like model predictive control, control barrier functions, differentiable predictive control, and reinforcement learning.
• Explore cutting-edge topics such as robotic manipulation, Sim2Real transfer, vision-language-action models, and foundation models for robotics to enhance task learning and generalization across platforms.
• Contribute to software development, including physics-based simulators (e.g., MuJoCo, IsaacSim, Gazebo), ROS, and machine learning frameworks (e.g., PyTorch, JAX, TensorFlow).
• Design and maintain codebases supporting scalable experimentation, dataset acquisition, and integration of ML-enabled control systems in simulated and physical testbeds.
• Summarize technical findings, prepare peer-reviewed publications, and present results at conferences and journals.
• Collaborate with a multidisciplinary team of computer scientists, engineers, mathematicians, and domain experts.
• Mentor junior staff, post-doctoral researchers, and seek programmatic funding.

Requirements

• BS/BA and 7+ years of relevant work experience, or MS/MA and 5+ years, or PhD with 3+ years of relevant experience.
• Experience in design and integration of robotics systems, optimization, and AI/ML techniques.
• Strong programming skills in Python, Julia, C++, ROS, and machine learning frameworks such as PyTorch, JAX, TensorFlow.
• Knowledge of robot kinematics, dynamics, sensor integration, and perception pipelines.
• Experience with physics-simulation frameworks like MuJoCo, Gazebo, and IsaacSim.
• Ability to develop and evaluate integrated robotic systems across simulation and real-world environments.
• Proven track record of impactful results in robotics and AI, including publications, projects, or grants.
• Excellent communication and interpersonal skills for interdisciplinary collaboration.

Nice to Have

• PhD or MS in Robotics, Computer Science, Applied Mathematics, Electrical Engineering, Mechanical/Aerospace Engineering, or related fields.
• Experience leading or contributing to R&D proposals for federal agencies (e.g., DOE, DARPA, NSF).
• Deep understanding of robot kinematics, dynamics, and perception pipelines.
• Familiarity with multimodal perception and embodied AI for autonomous decision-making.
• Experience with cloud and edge deployment of machine learning models.
• Knowledge of modern scientific deep learning methods such as Neural ODEs, PINNs, Hamiltonian neural networks, graph neural networks.
• Leadership in delivering complex robotics solutions with successful Sim2Real transfer.
• Mentoring experience and a history of shaping research vision.

Qualifications

• Minimum of BS/BA with 7+ years, MS/MA with 5+ years, or PhD with 3+ years of relevant experience
• Relevant experience in robotics, AI, or related fields

Benefits & Perks

• Health insurance, dental insurance, vision insurance
• Health savings account, flexible spending accounts
• Basic life insurance, disability insurance
• Employee assistance program, business travel insurance
• Tuition assistance, parental bonding leave, surrogacy and adoption support, fertility support
• Company-funded pension plan, 401k savings plan
• Up to 120 vacation hours per year, ten paid holidays