Principal Robotic Controls Engineer

ABOUT THE ROLE Own the controls and estimation architecture for a precision laser beam director within a defense technology team. You will take algorithms from modeling and simulation through embedded hardware and field testing, helping deliver accurate tracking against dynamic targets. WHAT YOU'LL DO - Design the control architecture for coarse gimbals and fine steering mirrors, including bandwidth allocation, multi-rate design, and stage handoffs. - Develop estimators that fuse radar, EO/IR, and inertial data into predicted aimpoints, with latency compensation. - Implement line-of-sight stabilization and jitter rejection using inertial stabilization, accelerometer feedforward, and adaptive filtering. - Build and manage pointing error budgets across jitter, bias, latency, and atmospheric effects, then validate precision against moving targets in the field. - Model plants and identify system dynamics in time and frequency domains, validating models through hardware-in-the-loop testing. - Analyze robustness, stability margins, sensitivity, and performance under disturbances and parameter variation. - Integrate fire-control handoffs, engagement sequencing, dwell maintenance, and safety interlocks with partner engineering teams. - Move algorithms from simulation to embedded hardware, supporting kHz-rate control loops and reviewing controls and sensor integration. - Serve as a technical anchor and mentor through hands-on engineering contributions. WHAT WE'RE LOOKING FOR - 10 or more years closing loops on precision pointing, tracking, or stabilization systems, including fielded systems with measured performance. - PhD-level depth in control theory and estimation, or a master's degree with a research-grade record of applying control theory to fielded hardware. - Strong background in robust control, including H-infinity, mu-synthesis, and LQG, and estimation methods such as Kalman variants, IMM, and nonlinear observers. - Hands-on experience with microradian-class pointing systems, such as beam directors, fine steering mirrors, gimbaled sensors, laser communication terminals, telescopes, spacecraft, or comparable precision mechatronics. - Experience with C or C++ control loops on embedded or RTOS platforms, multi-rate and sampled-data design, and real-time hardware-in-the-loop validation. - Proven system identification and plant modeling experience with real structural dynamics. - MATLAB/Simulink, C/C++, Python, RTOS, Kalman filtering, or adaptive control experience is relevant. - Defense or high-energy laser experience, adaptive optics, atmospheric propagation modeling, publications or patents, and ability to obtain a security clearance are additional assets. COMPENSATION & BENEFITS Base salary: $250,000 to $315,000 USD annually. Equity and visa sponsorship details were not provided. LOCATION On-site in Los Lunas, New Mexico, United States.