Staff Researcher, Materials & Advanced Packaging

Touchdown Labs; San Francisco, Northern (CA, KY); Hybrid; USD 180,000 - 240,000; Full time

Job summary

Touchdown Labs seeks a Research Member of Technical Staff to lead material and manufacturing research in the SF Bay Area. You will connect system requirements to material properties, design controlled experiments, and manage transfer readiness through evidence-backed decisions.

The role involves coordination across labs, vendors, and internal teams, with emphasis on reliability, yield, and manufacturability. Remote work within the US may be considered for the right candidate.

Qualifications

• PhD or equivalent depth in materials science, chemical engineering, mechanical engineering, semiconductor processing, packaging, or a related field.
• Experience designing controlled experiments and interpreting characterization, metrology, reliability, yield, or process data.
• Understanding of contamination, chemical and equipment safety, process variation, yield, and manufacturing transfer.
• Ability to connect material properties to device, package, thermal, mechanical, or manufacturing behavior.
• Experience coordinating work across design, process, equipment, metrology, test, and external research teams.

Responsibilities

• Translate thermal, electrical, mechanical, memory, package, reliability, or manufacturing limits into measurable material and process requirements.
• Design experiments, controls, comparators, split lots, sample plans, metrology, statistical analysis, decision logs, and failure criteria.
• Coordinate scoped work with laboratories, universities, manufacturers, or industry partners with proper terms.
• Connect research results to device behavior, package integration, operating conditions, cost, supply, safety, and repeatability.

Skills

Experimental design

Cross-functional collaboration

Data interpretation

Education

PhD in materials science or related field

Tools

Python

R

DOE

Job description

Touchdown Labs seeks a Research Member of Technical Staff to lead material and manufacturing research in the SF Bay Area. You will connect system requirements to material properties, design controlled experiments, and manage transfer readiness through evidence-backed decisions.

The role involves coordination across labs, vendors, and internal teams, with emphasis on reliability, yield, and manufacturability. Remote work within the US may be considered for the right candidate.