Position Title: Systems Engineer
Work Location: Santa Clara, CA
Assignment Duration: 12 months
Work Arrangement: Onsite

Position Summary:
We are seeking a passionate Systems Engineer to join our Systems Development Group to support the Next Generation Sequencing (NGS) products.
The candidate is expected to be a hands-on key contributor in the feasibility, development, customer support, and integration phases of end-to-end NGS solutions, according to customer & product requirements, and applicable regulatory and quality standards.

Background & Context:
Our organization’s Santa Clara site is developing new technologies to make genetic testing easy, reliable, and affordable for applications including newborn screening, cancer, and infectious disease diagnostics.

Key Responsibilities:

• Become an expert on the operation of the Single Molecule Sequencing Platform.

• Perform a variety of sample prep, library, or sequencing and sequencing related experiments on a daily basis, help to analyze and interpret the data.

• General support of diverse research and development activities.

• Customer support activities such as monitoring runs, documenting and communicating defects, and following escalation paths to resolve customer issues.

• Contribute to the platform verification team as a member by executing, analyzing, and interpreting the results of platform verification studies.

• Perform all work using best laboratory practices and maintain a well-organized and concise record of work performed and progress made.

• Assist engineers with hardware design through testing subcomponents.

• Analyze data, derive conclusions, document findings, write SOPs and prepare reports for sharing within and between R&D groups.

• Setup strong experimental designs while working independently.

• Troubleshoot instrument failures and seek out specialized help as needed.

• Develop and deploy a wide range of technologies, including sample extraction, library prep, and sequencing.

• Develop, execute, and document test cases for verification and validation. Ensures complete and comprehensive coverage of requirements in the test campaigns.

• Customer support through monitoring of runs, early morning meetings to discuss defects, results and progress, QC of reagents and configuration used for customer, possible travel to customer sites.

• Support of instrument fleet to learn troubleshooting techniques as needed to assist R&D and to support customers.

• Perform system integration and testing activities and verify system performance through simulation, tests, and measurements.

• Work independently with general management direction to drive product development and collaborations to identify opportunities for continuous improvement.

• Keep supervisor/project leader informed of project status, particularly of significant findings and results in critical problem areas.

Qualification & Experience:

• B.S. or M.S. or PhD degree in the science/chemistry/engineering required and 1-5 years of experience (depending on educational background).

• Previous laboratory experience required.

• Familiarity with MATLAB, GIT, Python or similar tools for data analysis and/or automation.

• Previous experience with prototype instruments or DNA sequencing desirable.

• Previous experience with PCR required.

• Excellent written and oral communication skills are essential.

• Demonstrated ability to work well in teams and across scientific disciplines is essential.

• The candidate should be passionate, self-motivated, and possess a strong desire to acquire on-the-job training.

 
 
At SPECTRAFORCE, we are committed to maintaining a workplace that ensures fair compensation and wage transparency in adherence with all applicable state and local laws. This position’s starting pay is: $ 75.68/hr.