Hypersonics TPS Thermal Engineer — Ablation Expert

Anduril Industries; Mountain View (CA); On-site; USD 150,000 - 186,000; Full time

Job summary

Anduril Industries is seeking a Thermal Engineer specializing in Thermal Protection Systems to design, analyze, and validate TPS for hypersonic and high-speed flight systems operating in extreme aerothermal environments.

You will own TPS design, material selection, and thermal analysis, perform aerothermal heating assessments, and model material response to predict recession and margins, collaborating with cross-functional teams to ensure robust performance.

Qualifications

• MS or PhD in Aerospace Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Applied Physics, or a related field with a focus on aerothermodynamics, heat transfer, thermal sciences, or materials science.
• 2+ years of experience in TPS design, aerothermal analysis, or high-temperature material response for aerospace or defense systems.
• Strong first-principles understanding of aerodynamic heating, ablation, high-temperature heat transfer, and material thermal response.
• Experience with material response modeling tools such as FIAT, CMA, TITAN, or equivalent ablation/thermal response codes.
• Experience supporting thermal design for hypersonic vehicles, reentry systems, missiles, rocket nozzles, or other systems operating in extreme aerothermal environments.
• Ability to obtain and maintain a U.S. Top Secret security clearance.

Responsibilities

• Own TPS design, material selection, and thermal analysis for hypersonic and high-speed flight vehicles, including missiles, reentry systems, and advanced flight platforms.
• Perform aerothermal heating analysis using engineering correlations, boundary-layer methods, and CFD to define the thermal environment across flight trajectories.
• Conduct ablation and material response modeling to predict TPS recession, in-depth thermal response, and structural thermal margins under mission-representative conditions.
• Evaluate and select TPS materials, including carbon phenolic, PICA, silicone-based ablators, ceramics, and high-temperature composites, based on aerothermal loads, mass constraints, and manufacturability.
• Partner with aerodynamics, structures, propulsion, and systems engineers to integrate TPS into vehicle design while managing mass, volume, and performance tradeoffs.
• Define and execute thermal and material characterization tests, including arcjet testing, furnace testing, and instrumented flight-article thermal testing.
• Build and maintain thermal models spanning hand calculations through detailed FEA/CFD to predict system performance, establish design limits, and support qualification.
• Present TPS status, risks, tradeoffs, and recommendations in internal design reviews and customer-facing technical reviews.
• Support failure reviews and root-cause investigations using test data, thermal analysis, and first-principles reasoning.

Skills

TPS design

Aerothermal analysis

Material response modeling

First-principles heat transfer

CFD

Cross-functional collaboration

Security clearance

Education

MS or PhD in Aerospace/Mechanical Engineering

Tools

FIAT

CMA

TITAN

Job description

Anduril Industries is seeking a Thermal Engineer specializing in Thermal Protection Systems to design, analyze, and validate TPS for hypersonic and high-speed flight systems operating in extreme aerothermal environments.

You will own TPS design, material selection, and thermal analysis, perform aerothermal heating assessments, and model material response to predict recession and margins, collaborating with cross-functional teams to ensure robust performance.