Guidance, Navigation, and Control (GNC) Research Engineer - The Charles Stark Draper Laboratory Inc

Draper is an independent, nonprofit research and development company headquartered in Cambridge, MA. The 2,000+ employees of Draper tackle important national challenges with a promise of delivering successful and usable solutions. From military defense and space exploration to biomedical engineering, lives often depend on the solutions we provide. Our multidisciplinary teams of engineers and scientists work in a collaborative environment that inspires the cross-fertilization of ideas necessary for true innovation. For more information about Draper, visit www.draper.com.

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Equal Employment Opportunity

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The Strategic Weapon Systems division at Draper is seeking a Guidance, Navigation, and Control (GNC) Research Engineer to work within multi-disciplinary teams to conceptualize and prototype advanced guidance technologies to enable new system capabilities that are of strategic importance to the nation.  This role will be of high interest to applicants that desire to develop expertise in a broad array of both hardware and software GNC technologies while remaining focused on delivering mission-level capability solutions to the warfighter.  Relevant mission domains may include: global strike and/or strategic deterrent systems, hypersonics, missile defense systems, space systems, precision guided munitions, and autonomous air/sea vehicles.

Duties and responsibilities may include:

• Identification of customer mission needs and development of use cases;
• Analysis of mission use cases to derive subsystem requirements;
• Conceptualization of novel GNC hardware, software, and system solutions;
• Detailed functional and performance modeling of component technologies;
• Development of research proposals and plans;
• Development of test strategies/plans for prototype technology;
• Analysis of performance and test data;
• Interaction with academic collaborators;
• Briefing of results to leadership and government sponsors.

A successful candidate will be highly motivated to: (a) support the delivery of technology solutions that are of strategic importance to the nation in the context of evolving threats from peer and near-peer competitors, and (b) build deeper expertise in both the core mission domain and underlying GNC technology.  Working in a dynamic team environment developing state-of-the-art weapon/GN&C systems will provide exposure to a wide range of advanced technologies as well as afford opportunities for increased leadership/impact on the development of new war-fighter capability.

Applicants must have the following key qualifications:

• An M.S. degree or higher in engineering or physics;
• Foundational knowledge of guidance, navigation, and control (GNC) technology;
• Thesis or dissertation research relevant to enabling GNC or strategic missions;
• Demonstrated ability to formulate a research program plan and write proposals;
• Practical experience with simulation-based performance analysis;
• Strong presentation skills and the ability to articulate complex technical ideas.

Any of the following additional qualifications are highly desirable:

• 2+ years of professional experience in development of defense/space systems;
• Deep expertise with respect to either/both GNC hardware/software technology;
• Domain experience with respect to strategic weapon systems, as defined above;
• Experience with multi-objective optimization techniques;
• Experience with model-based systems engineering and system modeling using SysML.

Applicants selected will be subject to a government security investigation and must meet eligibility requirements for access to classified information.

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