Senior Data Curation Architect for AI/ML Readiness

Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory; Laurel (MD); On-site; USD 105,000 - 290,000; Full time

Job summary

Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory seeks a Principal Data Curation Architect to lead data-management and data-curation capabilities within a sophisticated research and classified IT environment. You will drive end-to-end data pipelines, governance, documentation, and lifecycle management to support researchers and mission teams.

You will collaborate with data owners, IT, cybersecurity, security officers, and leadership to ensure data is discoverable, understandable, governed, and reusable,

Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in library/information science, data science, scientific research or a related field.
• At least 2 years of professional experience leading technology projects, application/data-management initiatives, or related technical projects.
• Demonstrated proficiency in curating large, structured datasets, including data quality assessment, normalization, and traceable documentation of curation actions.
• Demonstrated experience establishing or improving technology processes, workflows, governance practices, or operational capabilities.
• Experience leading multidisciplinary teams involving technical experts, business/mission partners, quality assurance, security, and/or compliance teams.
• Background leading the lifecycle of technology systems, applications, or data-intensive solutions.
• Solid Understanding of FAIR data principles and research data-management practices.
• Proficiency in gathering requirements, analyzing business/mission needs, developing implementation approaches, managing risks, and delivering technology solutions.
• Experience developing standard operating procedures, governance documentation, process standards, and implementation plans.
• Ability to communicate effectively with technical teams, researchers, senior leadership, security staff, and program leadership.
• Demonstrated ability to work in a complex environment with contending priorities and ambiguous requirements.
• Are able to obtain a Secret security clearance. If selected, you will be subject to a government security clearance investigation and must meet the requirements for access to classified information. Eligibility requirements include U.S. citizenship.

Responsibilities

• Lead projects to establish and implement data-management and curation capabilities, including project objectives, scope, schedules, budget estimates, and measures of success.
• Develop, implement and manage end-to-end data pipelines and lifecycle workflows, including data intake, assessment, cleaning, documentation, quality review, versioning, retention, and archiving.
• Lead the inventory and assessment of legacy and active research data, working with data owners managing and enriching raw information so it stays accurate, searchable, and useful over time.
• Create and implement functional data governance processes, roles, responsibilities, standards, and operating procedures.
• Train, teach, and mentor, data owners, and consumers on how to collate, format, document, and curate data for optimal downstream usage and AI/ML readiness.
• Drive the evaluation, selection, configuration, and implementation of data catalogs, metadata-management tools, reporting automation, and new analytics solutions in collaboration with IT and cybersecurity.
• Establish lightweight metadata and documentation standards aligned with FAIR principles and applicable sponsor, security, and data-management expectations.
• Coordinate technical teams and subject-matter experts to prepare and package datasets for downstream research, analytics, and AI/ML use.
• Develop project plans, schedules, status reports, risk registers, and executive-level briefings to advise project leadership on priorities, risks, and resource requirements.
• Find opportunities to improve existing processes, systems, and tools through automation, integration, and technology modernization.
• Develop and maintain standard operating procedures, templates, guidance, and training materials.

Skills

Data governance

Project management

Data pipelines

Metadata management

FAIR principles

Stakeholder engagement

AI/ML readiness

Education

Bachelor's degree

Master/PhD preferred

Tools

Databases

SQL

ETL pipelines

Reporting automation

Job description

Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory seeks a Principal Data Curation Architect to lead data-management and data-curation capabilities within a sophisticated research and classified IT environment. You will drive end-to-end data pipelines, governance, documentation, and lifecycle management to support researchers and mission teams.

You will collaborate with data owners, IT, cybersecurity, security officers, and leadership to ensure data is discoverable, understandable, governed, and reusable,