Lead Optical Engineer: Stray Light & Imaging Systems

L3Harris Technologies, Inc.; City of Rochester (NY); On-site; USD 117,000 - 218,000; Full time

Job summary

L3Harris Technologies, Inc. in Rochester, NY seeks a Lead Optical Engineer specializing in stray light to drive the design and evaluation of advanced optical systems for aerospace/defense. This role emphasizes modeling, analysis, and end-to-end performance assessment across cross-functional teams.

The ideal candidate has deep optical engineering expertise, hands-on hardware exposure, and a track record leading complex technical work, including stray light mitigation for space-based payloads.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s Degree and minimum 9 years of prior relevant experience.
• Graduate Degree and a minimum of 7 years of prior related experience.
• In lieu of a degree, minimum of 13 years of prior related experience.
• 2-3 years of relevant experience in optical stray light analysis tools such as FRED
• Ability to obtain a federal security clearance

Responsibilities

• Lead or support optical engineering activities for advanced imaging, sensing, and electro-optical systems.
• Lead development of non-sequential stray light and radiometric models for active and passive imaging systems, including assessment of scattering, ghosting, and optical throughput for space-based payloads.
• Support system performance analysis and verification of key optical requirements such as wavefront error, line of sight, distortion, focus, focal length, image quality, and related optical performance metrics.
• Perform end-to-end optical performance analyses that connect design features to mission-level image quality, signal-to-noise, and sensitivity outcomes, and communicate resulting risks, margins, and mitigation recommendations to program teams.
• Contribute to assessment of optical system behavior including ghosting, scattering, and stray light performance, as needed for system design and verification efforts.
• Mentor junior engineers and provide guidance in optical analysis, test execution, and engineering best practices.

Skills

Stray light analysis

System engineering

Cross-functional collaboration

Education

Bachelor’s Degree + 9y exp

Graduate Degree +7y exp

Tools

FRED

Zygo Mx

QED.NET

CodeV

Zemax OpticStudio

Python

Matlab

Job description

L3Harris Technologies, Inc. in Rochester, NY seeks a Lead Optical Engineer specializing in stray light to drive the design and evaluation of advanced optical systems for aerospace/defense. This role emphasizes modeling, analysis, and end-to-end performance assessment across cross-functional teams.

The ideal candidate has deep optical engineering expertise, hands-on hardware exposure, and a track record leading complex technical work, including stray light mitigation for space-based payloads.