Senior Laser Development Physicist
Location: Rehovot
A leading company in its field, with sites in Israel and globally, specializing in the development, manufacturing, and sales of unique electro-optical systems for world-leading tier-1 companies, is seeking an experienced Physicist for advanced laser system development.
We are looking for a Physicist with substantial experience in laser development who combines deep physics insight with strong engineering and practical execution capabilities. The ideal candidate can take a physical concept or requirement from analysis and design through experimentation, integration, and performance validation in a fully functioning system.
This is a hands-on development role, combining design and analysis with practical laboratory work, experiments, alignments, troubleshooting, and system integration. You will join a broad multidisciplinary R&D team and collaborate closely with system, optics, electronics, electrical, mechanical, thermal, control, software, and integration engineers.
Responsibilities
- Physical and optical development and design of electro-optical subsystems.
- Collaborating on the definition of laser architecture and physical solutions according to system performance requirements.
- Performing physical and optical calculations and analyses.
- Designing optical chains, managing optical power, beam quality, stability, efficiency, and thermal effects.
- Selecting and adapting laser sources, optical components, fibers, and fiber-optic components.
- Planning experiments and proofs-of-concept (PoC) to evaluate solutions and mitigate technological risks.
- Setting up and aligning laser systems and optical experiments in the laboratory.
- Characterizing performance, analyzing results, and drawing conclusions for design iteration.
- Performing troubleshooting and root-cause analysis of physical, optical, and system failures.
- Actively participating in subsystem integration and overall system performance verification.
- Partnering in defining requirements and interfaces for electronics, power, cooling, control, and mechanical systems.
- Authoring design documentation, specifications, test reports, and Verification & Validation (V&V) documents.
- Supporting the transition from development to production, as well as maintaining and upgrading existing systems.
Requirements
- M.Sc. in Physics – Mandatory.
- Ph.D. in relevant fields – Significant advantage.
- Extensive, proven experience in laser system development.
- Substantial hands-on experience working in a laser laboratory.
- Deep understanding of laser physics and optics.
- Experience in setting up and characterizing complex optical and electro-optical systems.
- Strong ability to translate physical models into practical engineering solutions.
- Experience in experiment design, measurement, data analysis, and performance verification.
- Experience working in a multidisciplinary environment – Significant advantage.
- Experience with high-power lasers, fiber lasers, solid-state lasers, optical amplifiers, or beam delivery systems – Significant advantage.
- Familiarity with cooling systems, power systems, control, and laser safety – Advantage.
Candidate Profile
- We are looking for a physicist who loves building and developing, not just conducting pure research.
- A professional with strong physical curiosity, solid analytical thinking, and a practical mindset—equally comfortable working with theoretical models/calculations and hands-on with open hardware on the optical bench.
- Well-suited for someone who enjoys tackling complex, open-ended problems that often push the boundaries of physical and technological limits.
- Able to take an open problem, analyze it, propose alternatives, perform trade-offs between performance, risks, cost, and timelines, and drive the solution through to complete implementation and verification.
- Requires a combination of technical depth, creativity, autonomy, teamwork, and the ability to operate in a demanding and dynamic environment.
- High degree of personal accountability and full ownership of tasks—from understanding requirements and physics concepts through design and testing to a stable, reproducible system that meets all targets.
Reporting to: Physics Domain Manager
