Autonomous Lab Software Engineer

Ellison Institute of Technology; Oxford; On-site; GBP 70,000 - 120,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Enhanced holiday pay

Pension

Life Assurance

Income Protection

Private Medical Insurance

Hospital Cash Plan

Therapy Services

Perk Box

Electric Car Scheme

Job summary

Ellison Institute of Technology in Oxford is seeking a Scientific Software Engineer to build software that runs autonomous laboratories. You will join the AI and Robotics Institute, collaborating with software, mechanical, electrical, robotics, and biology teams, translating tacit lab knowledge into robust software.

You’ll design data models, verification steps, and interfaces for scientists, with real lab exposure to validate runs and ensure reliability.

Qualifications

• Strong professional Python with maintained code and testing.
• Sound software engineering judgement and maintainable design.
• Understanding of experimental design and controls.
• Experience with scientific data handling and metadata.
• Comfort with ambiguity in an R&D setting.
• Excellent communication between scientists and engineers.

Responsibilities

• Capture scientific knowledge into automated workflows with validation.
• Define what must be sensed and verified for trusted results.
• Design data models and pipelines for experimental data and provenance.
• Build interfaces for scientists (protocol formats, CLI, web UIs).
• Validate automated protocols against manual baselines.
• Develop and maintain lab hardware integrations.
• Contribute to orchestration and execution layer across the platform.
• Explain engineering constraints to scientists.
• Extend internal Python libraries and services with testable interfaces.
• Support commissioning and debugging in the lab.
• Contribute to CI, testing, and documentation.

Skills

Python

Software engineering

Version control

Code review

Experimental design

Data handling

Communication

Tools

Vendor SDKs

CLI tooling

Web dashboards

Job description

Ellison Institute of Technology in Oxford is seeking a Scientific Software Engineer to build software that runs autonomous laboratories. You will join the AI and Robotics Institute, collaborating with software, mechanical, electrical, robotics, and biology teams, translating tacit lab knowledge into robust software.

You’ll design data models, verification steps, and interfaces for scientists, with real lab exposure to validate runs and ensure reliability.