Weapon Systems Surveillance Engineer; R&D Engineer

What You Will Do

The Weapon Systems Engineering (W) Division provides systems engineering, technical leadership, and program management to ensure the safety, reliability, and security of our nation’s nuclear stockpile throughout its life cycle. Within W Division, the Weapon Systems Surveillance Group (W‑9) supports stockpile surveillance and assessment by establishing test requirements, coordinating surveillance activities across the Nuclear Security Enterprise, evaluating results, and communicating technical findings that inform annual assessment and long‑term health decisions.

It is important to note that this position is open for external candidates only to apply.

The successful candidate will serve as a Weapon System Surveillance Engineer for the W88 system. In this role, you will help plan and execute surveillance activities for stockpile‑return components and materials, coordinate with production agencies and design stakeholders, evaluate surveillance data, and communicate results to engineering, physics, programmatic, and federal partners. This position offers a high degree of technical independence, broad interaction across LANL and the Nuclear Security Enterprise, and the opportunity to contribute directly to decisions that support the continued safety and reliability of the nuclear stockpile.

Additional responsibilities include:

• Translate Design Agency surveillance requirements into executable test direction, sample‑selection instructions, engineering authorization documents, and production agency guidance.
• Lead or support qualification of new and existing surveillance tests, including development of test requirements, experimental methods, procedures, work packages, and supporting documentation.
• Evaluate surveillance data from components, materials, production agency reports, and other data streams to assess system health, identify aging trends, and support engineering judgment.
• Prepare annual surveillance summaries, briefings, and inputs to the W88 Annual Assessment process, including communicating technical results to engineering, physics, management and federal stakeholders.
• Lead or support investigations of anomalous observations reported during surveillance.
• Coordinate with component surveillance engineers and program partners to identify knowledge gaps, evaluate new diagnostic or test capabilities, and recommend improvements to surveillance methods.
• Represent the surveillance program in technical meetings, planning committees, reviews, and stakeholder briefings, including advocating for recommendations.
• Maintain and improve surveillance program requirements, documentation, schedules, and records to ensure a healthy, comprehensive, and defensible surveillance program.

Minimum Job Requirements

• Engineering Experience
  :
  Demonstrated knowledge of engineering principles relevant to complex systems, components, materials, testing, reliability, production, or surveillance. Relevant experience may include nuclear weapon systems, aerospace, defense, nuclear, high‑consequence operations, manufacturing, quality, or other regulated technical environments.
• Technical Leadership
  :
  Demonstrated ability to lead technical tasks or projects, coordinate contributors across organizations, manage milestones and deliverables, risks and recommendations.
• Data Evaluation and Problem Solving
  :
  Demonstrated ability to evaluate technical data, identify trends or anomalies, integrate information from multiple sources, and develop defensible conclusions or recommendations.
• Technical Documentation and Requirements
  :
  Experience developing, reviewing or maintaining technical requirements, procedures, work instructions, test plans, reports or other formal technical documentation.
• Communication and Teamwork
  :
  Demonstrated ability to communicate effectively through written documentation, briefings, and technical discussions with coworkers, management and customers. Proven record of working effectively as a team member. Demonstrated ability to seek technical input from experts.
• Education/Experience
  :
  Position requires a Master’s Degree in Engineering from an accredited institution and 6 years of related experience; or an…