Data Scientist II – Space AI & Autonomy

NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory; United States; On-site; USD 123,000 - 136,000; Full time

Job summary

NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California seeks a Data Scientist II to advance fundamental AI and optimization research for spacecraft autonomy and mission operations automation.

You will develop planning, scheduling, and resource allocation algorithms for autonomous systems, and apply search-based and constraint-based methods to large-scale problems, supporting ground and flight operations across missions such as ECOSTRESS, OCO-3, EMIT, and NISAR.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in computer science or related discipline with at least 3 years of experience.
• Master’s degree in related fields with at least 1 year of experience.
• PhD in related fields with 0 years of related work experience.

Responsibilities

• Develop planning, scheduling, resource allocation, and execution algorithms for autonomous systems.
• Develop search-based, constraint-based, and optimization systems for large-scale problems.
• Represent and reason about geometric and operational constraints for observation planning.
• Support broader team efforts in automation and resource allocation.

Skills

Software development

Artificial intelligence

Operations research

Resource allocation

Rust

C++

Python

Java

Education

Bachelor’s degree in computer science or related discipline

Master’s degree in similar disciplines

PhD in similar disciplines

Job description

NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California seeks a Data Scientist II to advance fundamental AI and optimization research for spacecraft autonomy and mission operations automation.

You will develop planning, scheduling, and resource allocation algorithms for autonomous systems, and apply search-based and constraint-based methods to large-scale problems, supporting ground and flight operations across missions such as ECOSTRESS, OCO-3, EMIT, and NISAR.