Lead Robot Navigation & AI Planning Scientist

Amazon; San Francisco (CA); On-site; USD 172,000 - 222,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

RSUs

Health insurance

401(k) matching

Paid time off

Parental leave

Job summary

Amazon is seeking a Sr. Scientist in Robot Navigation in San Francisco to architect and deploy intelligent, safe navigation systems for autonomous robots. You will blend learning-based planning with principled control, including MPC-based trajectory planning, and contribute to production-grade deployment.

The role requires a PhD and strong publication track; you will mentor, collaborate with cross-functional teams, and advance perception and navigation research across real-world environments.

Qualifications

• PhD in Robotics, Computer Science, Electrical Engineering, Controls, or a related field.
• 2+ years of experience in robot navigation, motion planning, or autonomous systems.
• Deep expertise in learning-based approaches to navigation (imitation learning, RL, neural motion planning).
• Strong experience with Model Predictive Control (MPC) and optimization-based planning (PyTorch, JAX, or equivalent).
• Proven track record translating research into deployed systems.

Responsibilities

• Design, develop, and deploy perception algorithms for robotics systems, including object detection, segmentation, tracking, depth estimation, and scene understanding.
• Lead research initiatives in computer vision, sensor fusion and 3D perception.
• Collaborate with cross-functional teams to define and deliver perception capabilities.
• Drive end-to-end ownership of ML models from data collection to training, evaluation, and deployment.
• Mentor junior scientists and engineers; contribute to a culture of technical excellence.
• Define and track metrics to measure perception system performance.
• Publish research findings in top venues and contribute to patents.

Skills

C++

Python

Java

Machine learning

Robotics

MPC planning

Education

PhD in Robotics, CS, EE, or Controls

Tools

ROS/ROS2

PyTorch

JAX

Isaac Sim

MuJoCo

Job description

Amazon is seeking a Sr. Scientist in Robot Navigation in San Francisco to architect and deploy intelligent, safe navigation systems for autonomous robots. You will blend learning-based planning with principled control, including MPC-based trajectory planning, and contribute to production-grade deployment.

The role requires a PhD and strong publication track; you will mentor, collaborate with cross-functional teams, and advance perception and navigation research across real-world environments.