Senior Instrument Control Software Engineer
About the Role:
We are looking for a highly skilled Senior Instrument Control Software Engineer with strong hands-on Python development experience and expertise in developing software that directly interacts with physical hardware. The ideal candidate will have experience in robotics, laboratory automation, scientific instrumentation, medical devices, semiconductor equipment, or complex electromechanical systems. This role focuses on improving the reliability, stability, fault tolerance, and performance of sophisticated hardware-integrated software systems.
Key Responsibilities:
Design, develop, debug, and maintain production-quality Python software for instrument control and hardware integration.
Integrate and troubleshoot robotic systems, motors, sensors, cameras, pumps, actuators, and other electromechanical devices.
Develop robust hardware state management, persistence, initialization, and recovery mechanisms.
Ensure safe recovery of physical hardware following software crashes, unexpected restarts, or power interruptions.
Diagnose complex failures across application software, embedded controllers, firmware, Linux environments, and physical devices.
Implement fault detection, error handling, retries, timeouts, and automated recovery mechanisms.
Develop concurrent and asynchronous Python applications for coordinating multiple hardware components.
Troubleshoot communication interfaces, including serial, USB, TCP/IP, and device-level protocols.
Analyze system logs, device events, and hardware behavior to identify root causes and implement permanent solutions.
Maintain and improve large, established Python codebases, including refactoring, testing, and performance optimization.
Collaborate with firmware, electrical, mechanical, and systems engineering teams.
Required Qualifications:
Strong professional software engineering experience with advanced production Python development.
Hands-on experience building software that directly controls or communicates with physical hardware.
Experience with robotics, instrument control, industrial automation, or similar hardware-integrated systems.
Strong understanding of hardware state management, state machines, fault tolerance, and recovery mechanisms.
Experience with Python multithreading, multiprocessing, asynchronous programming, or concurrent systems.
Proficiency in Linux environments, debugging, and system-level troubleshooting.
Experience integrating sensors, motors, controllers, cameras, or other physical devices.
Strong software architecture, debugging, testing, and problem-solving skills.
Ability to independently investigate complex failures in existing software systems.
Excellent communication and cross-functional collaboration skills.
Preferred Qualifications:
Scientific instrumentation or laboratory automation experience.
Robotics and precision motion-control systems.
Biotechnology, medical devices, or semiconductor equipment experience.
Embedded Linux, firmware, C/C++, or microcontroller experience.
Hardware-in-the-loop (HIL) or software-in-the-loop (SIL) testing.
Device communication protocols such as UART, USB, TCP/IP, SPI, I2C, or MQTT.Instrument calibration, safety interlocks, and automated diagnostic systems.