We are seeking an Applied Scientist to join Compass. In this role, you will own the interface between contact-rich manipulation and the Compass safety software in unstructured environments. You will design learning-based and model-based approaches to contact-rich manipulation when the environment changes unexpectedly. You will collaborate with perception, planning, and controls teams to close the loop from object detection through grasp execution, and you will deploy your algorithms on physical hardware across multiple manipulator platforms. This is an opportunity to define how Amazon's robots safely interact with the physical world: picking, placing, and handling the enormous diversity of objects that flow through our network.
Key job responsibilities
• Develop and deploy manipulation algorithms for contact-rich tasks and placement across diverse object geometries and material properties
• Design force-controlled manipulation strategies that operate safely within Amazon Compass safety constraints
• Build reactive manipulation policies that detect and recover from failures (slips, missed grasps, unexpected contacts) in real time
• Develop learning-based manipulation policies using RL, imitation learning, or hybrid approaches, and transfer them from simulation to physical hardware
• Define and maintain the interface contract between manipulation algorithms and the Compass safety layer, ensuring that grasp and motion plans respect safety bounds without unnecessary conservatism
• Collaborate with perception teams to leverage object pose estimation, tactile sensing, and contact detection for closed-loop manipulation
• Design simulation environments and training curricula for manipulation policy learning, including realistic contact physics and object diversity
• Evaluate manipulation performance through systematic hardware experiments, measuring grasp success rates, cycle times, and safety compliance
• Contribute to scientific publications and internal technical documentation
• Participate in cross-team design reviews and contribute to the broader manipulation and safety architecture
A day in the life
Amazon offers a full range of benefits that support you and eligible family members, including domestic partners and their children. Benefits can vary by location, the number of regularly scheduled hours you work, length of employment, and job status such as seasonal or temporary employment. The benefits that generally apply to regular, full-time employees include:
1. Medical, Dental, and Vision Coverage
2. Maternity and Parental Leave Options
3. Paid Time Off (PTO)
4. 401(k) Plan
If you are not sure that every qualification on the list above describes you exactly, we'd still love to hear from you! At Amazon, we value people with unique backgrounds, experiences, and skillsets. If you're passionate about this role and want to make an impact on a global scale, please apply!
BASIC QUALIFICATIONS
- PhD, or Master's degree and 4+ years of CS, CE, ML or related field experience
- Experience developing manipulation algorithms that have been tested on physical robot hardware
- Strong understanding of contact mechanics, force control, and grasp planning fundamentals
- Proficiency in Python and C++ with experience in robotics software development
- Experience with at least one of: reinforcement learning for manipulation, imitation learning, or model-based grasp planning
- Familiarity with physics simulators for contact-rich tasks (e.g., Isaac Gym/Sim, MuJoCo, Drake)
- Publication record at relevant venues (e.g., ICRA, IROS, RSS, CoRL, RA-L)
PREFERRED QUALIFICATIONS
- Experience in professional software development
- Knowledge of safety-critical control (control barrier functions, constrained optimization) as it applies to manipulation
- Experience with dexterous or multi-fingered manipulation and in-hand object reorientation
- Experience with sim-to-real transfer for contact-rich manipulation tasks
- Experience with compliant/impedance control and variable-stiffness actuation
- Familiarity with foundation models or large-scale pre-training applied to manipulation
- Experience working with multiple manipulator platforms (industrial arms, collaborative robots, custom end-effectors)
- Exposure to functional safety concepts as they relate to human-robot interaction during manipulation
- Strong collaboration skills and experience working in cross-functional robotics teams
The base salary range for this position is listed below. Your Amazon package will include sign-on payments and restricted stock units (RSUs). Final compensation will be determined based on factors including experience, qualifications, and location. Amazon also offers comprehensive benefits including health insurance (medical, dental, vision, prescription, Basic Life & AD&D insurance and option for Supplemental life plans, EAP, Mental Health Support, Medical Advice Line, Flexible Spending Accounts, Adoption and Surrogacy Reimbursement coverage), 401(k) matching, paid time off, and parental leave. Learn more about our benefits at https://amazon.jobs/en/benefits.
USA, CA, PASADENA - 142,800.00 - 193,200.00 USD annually
