Sandia National Laboratories

Cleared Member/Senior R&D Sensor Engineer - Environmental Controls and Sensors Team, Onsite

Sandia National Laboratories$102K — $199K *
Aerospace & Defense
Less than 5 years of experience
Job Overview by Ladders

Qualifications

  • Bachelor's degree or equivalent relevant education and experience in engineering or science.
  • Active DOE Q-level security clearance or equivalent at the time of application.
  • Graduate degree in Electrical or Computer Engineering preferred.
  • Experience with analog and digital circuit design.
  • Hands-on testing and debugging experience with circuit tools like oscilloscopes.

Responsibilities

  • Develop sensor designs to production-ready status through iterative cycles.
  • Collaborate with Systems Engineering to ensure sensor compliance with requirements.
  • Support qualification testing, including test plan development and execution.
  • Analyze environmental test data for reliability assessments.
  • Act as the technical interface between design and production teams.

Benefits

  • Work directly on initiatives contributing to national security.
  • Opportunity to collaborate with multidisciplinary teams.
  • Engage in innovative product engineering and development.
  • Travel opportunities of up to 25% to support projects.
  • Hands-on work with cutting-edge sensor technologies.
Full Job Description
What Your Job Will Be Like

Join our Environmental Controls and Sensors team as a Sensor Engineer (Job Title: R&D S&E Electronics Engineer), where you will play a key role in the design, characterization, qualification, and integration of sensor technologies across multiple Joint Test Assembly (JTA) programs. You will collaborate closely with multidisciplinary teams including mechanical engineers, designers, analysts, test personnel, and the Product Realization Team (PRT) Lead to execute engineering activities spanning the full product development lifecycle within the Nuclear Deterrence (ND) Product Realization Framework.

On a typical day, you may:
  • Develop sensor designs to production-ready status through iterative design-build-test cycles, working closely with production agencies to ensure manufacturability and quality.
  • Collaborate with Systems Engineering to ensure sensor products meet all requirements via requirements mapping (RQ-R), verification (RQ-V), and qualification planning (PQ).
  • Support sensor qualification testing and documentation, including developing test plans, executing tests, and analyzing results.
  • Perform detailed analysis of environmental test data, including long-term sensor drift studies and reliability assessments.
  • Serve as the technical interface between design teams and production/manufacturing agencies to resolve design and production challenges.
  • Partner with Sandia engineers and external collaborators across the nuclear complex to ensure project success and compliance with standards.

The position requires an ability to travel up to 25% to support the mission.

Due to the nature of the work, the selected applicant must be able to work onsite 100% of the time.

Applicants on this requisition may be interviewed by multiple organizations at Sandia National Laboratories.

Salary Range

$102,400 - $199,700

*Salary range is estimated, and actual salary will be determined after consideration of the selected candidate's experience and qualifications, and application of any approved geographic salary differential.

Qualifications We Require

  • A Bachelor's degree in a relevant discipline, or an equivalent combination of directly relevant education and engineering or scientific experience that demonstrates the knowledge, skills, and ability to perform independent research and development.
  • Position requires an active DOE Q-level security clearance or equivalent at time of application.


Qualifications We Desire

The ideal R&D S&E Electronics Engineer candidate for Sandia National Laboratories will in addition possess the following:
  • Graduate degree in Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering, or a highly related field where an independent research project was a graduation requirement (e.g., independent project, thesis, or dissertation).
  • Demonstrated experience with analog and digital circuit design and analysis.
  • Hands-on experience testing and de-bugging circuitry, with clear mastery of tools such as oscilloscopes, logic/network/spectrum analyzers, function/pulse generators, etc.
  • Proven experience with design and analysis tools (e.g., Matlab and LabVIEW), analog simulation codes (e.g., LTSpice), and HDL simulation codes (e.g.,ModelSim).
  • Strong verbal and written communication skills, ability to work effectively in multidisciplinary teams.

Also, for this posting we are seeking individuals with the following experience:
  • Proficiency in analyzing test data using statistical methods, trend analysis, and curve fitting.
  • Proven ability to work effectively in team environments, collaborating with internal groups and external production facilities.
  • Experience in sensor design, qualification, and transitioning hardware to production.
  • Familiarity with DOE, NNSA, DoD, other National Labs, and production facility processes.
  • Hands-on experience with a variety of sensors such as accelerometers, strain gauges, pressure sensors, temperature sensors, and force sensors.
  • Expertise in shock and vibration testing, including test plan development, execution, and data analysis.
  • Software development skills for instrumentation, including data acquisition and post-processing.
  • Demonstrated success in navigating production challenges to achieve hardware manufacturing goals.


About Our Team

The Environmental Controls and Sensors Department is a newly established team focused on advancing sensor technologies including shock, vibration, pressure, and thermal sensors as well as environmental control solutions that maintain system integrity by managing internal environments and limiting the ingress of water, oxygen, and electromagnetic radiation. As part of the National Security Products Center, our team plays a vital role in ensuring the safety, reliability, and security of the U.S. nuclear weapons stockpile through innovative product engineering, development, and qualification efforts. We are a dedicated group of engineers committed to supporting both current stockpile requirements and future modernization initiatives.

If you are passionate about sensor engineering and want to contribute to national security through cutting-edge technology development, we encourage you to apply.

Posting Duration

This posting will be open for application submissions for a minimum of three (3) calendar days, including the 'posting date'. Sandia reserves the right to extend the posting date at any time.

Security Clearance

Position requires a Department of Energy (DOE) Q security clearance to start, or equivalent active security clearance with another U.S. government agency (e.g., DOD). Sandia is required by DOE directive to conduct a pre-employment drug test and background review that includes checks of personal references, credit, law enforcement records, and employment/education verifications. Applicants for employment need to be able to maintain a DOE Q-level security clearance, which requires U.S. citizenship. If you hold more than one citizenship (i.e., of the U.S. and another country), your ability to obtain a security clearance may be impacted.

Applicants offered employment with Sandia are subject to a federal background investigation to meet the requirements for access to classified information or matter if the duties of the position require a DOE security clearance. Substance abuse or illegal drug use, falsification of information, criminal activity, serious misconduct or other indicators of untrustworthiness can cause a clearance to be denied or terminated by DOE, resulting in the inability to perform the duties assigned and subsequent termination of employment.

About Sandia National Laboratories

The Sandia National Laboratories is one of three National Nuclear Security Administration research and development laboratories in the United States, managed and operated privately by the National Technology and Engineering Solutions of Sandia. Their primary mission is to develop, engineer, and test the non-nuclear components of nuclear weapons and high technology. Headquartered on Kirtland Air Force Base in Albuquerque, New Mexico, it also has a campus in Livermore, California, next to Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, and a test facility in Waimea, Kauai, Hawaii. It is Sandia's mission to maintain the reliability and surety of nuclear weapon systems, conduct research and development in arms control and nonproliferation technologies, and investigate methods for the disposal of the United States' nuclear weapons program's hazardous waste. Other missions include research and development in energy and environmental programs, as well as the surety of critical national infrastructures. In addition, Sandia is home to a wide variety of research including computational biology, mathematics, materials science, alternative energy, psychology, MEMS, and cognitive science initiatives. Sandia formerly hosted ASCI Red, one of the world's fastest supercomputers until its decommission in 2006, and now hosts ASCI Red Storm, originally known as Thor's Hammer. Sandia is also home to the Z Machine. The Z Machine is the largest X-ray generator in the world and is designed to test materials in conditions of extreme temperature and pressure. It is operated by Sandia National Laboratories to gather data to aid in computer modeling of nuclear weapons. In December 2016, it was announced that National Technology and Engineering Solutions of Sandia, under the direction of Honeywell International, would take over the management of Sandia National Laboratories starting on May 1, 2017. Educational opportunities are conducted in collaboration with university students through several programs, including the Securing Top Academic Research & Talent at Historically Black Colleges and Universities Program and the Sandia University Partnerships Network.
Learn more about Sandia National Laboratories
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Founded
1948

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