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Job No: 26168, 26180
Department: Advanced Power Sys Rsch Ctr (APSRC)
Work Type: Staff - Full Time
Location: Advanced Power Systems Research Center (Near Houghton County Airport)
Full Time / Part Time: Full Time
Categories: Engineering, Research
Applications Close: Ensured Consideration Date: 06 Oct 2026
Michigan Technological University is an R1 technological research university founded in 1885 in Houghton. Our rural campus is situated just miles from Lake Superior in Michigan's scenic Upper Peninsula and is home to nearly 7,500 students from more than 60 countries around the world. Consistently ranked among the best universities in the country for return on investment, Michigan’s flagship technological university offers more than 185 undergraduate and graduate degree programs. Research focus areas include defense, health, energy, automotive, environment, and aerospace.
The area’s waters, forests, and snowfall support year-round recreation, including skiing, snowboarding, hiking, biking, and paddling. The University is an integral part of the region, supported by a friendly and welcoming community that takes pride in being a true college town. We embrace our size, climate, sense of adventure, and originality.
Summary
The Advanced Power Systems Research Center (APSRC) at Michigan Technological University is organized into a matrix structure with vertical teams organized around technical areas of revenue generation, and horizontal teams organized around support function. Both the vertical and horizontal groups are staffed by Research Professionals.
The Senior Research Engineer executes a variety of tasks (as described below) either in direct alignment with the customer (when in a vertically oriented group), or in a supporting role (when in a horizontally oriented group).
Responsibilities and Essential Duties
The Senior Research Engineer must be adept at a range of duties.
- Balance multiple projects while personally contributing to project progress by applying clearly extensive breadth and depth of knowledge.
- Solving complex problems through a high level of innovation, ingenuity, and creativity.
- Developing procedures.
- Stay abreast of the latest technologies, trends, and methods in technology areas related to the APSRC mission.
- Provide Technical Expertise and technical mentorship to junior staff and students.
- Author and Co-Author technical publications.
- Attend and give technical presentations at professional conferences.
- Serve on review committees for technical papers and similar within their technical area.
- The Senior Research Engineers working in Vertical groups will have increased responsibility for securing funding, including:
a. Architecting and Lead Authoring proposals.
b. Developing price quotes.
c. Building & Maintaining business relationships.
d. Lead meetings with customers in a sales type setting as required.
- Leading sub-parts of large projects, and being the PI on both small and large projects.
- Leading task force groups focused on both technical and non-technical outcomes.
- Project Management.
- Significant contributor to achieving department and group goals.
- Developing presentations and presenting results to partners and customers.
- Maintaining and working within budget on a sub-part of a large project or overall on a small project.
Required Education, Certifications, Licensures
MS Degree
Required Experience
12 - 18 yrs of related work history for entry into level.
Desirable Education and/or Experience
- Additional degree beyond minimum requirement, Additional BS in a different discipline or MS or PhD (preferred)
- Additional years of professional experience beyond minimum requirement
- Licensed Professional Engineer
- Experience Teaching
- Lean & 6-sigma training and application
Required Knowledge, Skills, and/or Abilities
- Demonstrated organizational skills, accuracy, and attention to detail.
- Experience creating and following budgets.
- Technical and non-technical problem-solving skills.
- Demonstrated ability to establish a plan to address scientific or technical issues.
- Demonstrated technical knowledge of engineering research & development activities (hypothesis, concept, design, simulation, analysis, fabrication, experimentation).
- Excellent written communication including powerpoint and authoring technical publications.
- Excellent public speaking including delivering technical presentations.
- Excellent customer service skills.
- Demonstrated initiative in tackling challenges and a hunger for more.
- Demonstrated humility.
- Demonstrated knowledge and skill in at least one scientific and technical area.
- Demonstrated knowledge of the product development cycle used in industry.
- Demonstrated ability to make technical decisions that affect the overall success of a project.
- Exceptional Emotional Intelligence.
- Exceptional interpersonal skills.
- Ability and willingness to travel.
- Ability and willingness to work flexible hours on occasion, when needed.
- Demonstrated ability to work independently without daily interaction with direct supervisor.
- Demonstrated ability to communicate effectively across cultural boundaries and work harmoniously with diverse groups of students, faculty, and staff.
Desirable Knowledge, Skills, and/or Abilities
Experience working on research projects with at least a CUI security clearance.
Work Environment and/or Physical Demands
WORK ENVIRONMENT: The work environment characteristics described here are representative of those an employee encounters while performing the essential functions of this job. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions.
- The employee may occasionally be required to lift up to 50 lbs.
- The noise level in the work environment is usually low to moderate, but can be high for short periods of time in the shop. Hearing protection is provided when noise levels are high.
- The employee may occasionally be required to travel.
Required Training and Other Conditions of Employment
Every employee at Michigan Technological University will receive the following training courses:
- Employee Safety Overview
- Annual Data Security Training
- Anti-Harassment, Discrimination, Retaliation Training
- Annual Title IX Training
Additional training will be required by the department on a periodic basis.
Background Check:
Offers of employment are contingent upon and not considered finalized until the required background check has been performed and the results received and assessed.
Full-Time Equivalent (FTE) % (1=100%)
1
FLSA Status
Exempt
Appointment Term
12 months
Shift
1st Shift
Pay Rate/Salary
The salary range for this position is $104,500 - $115,500. However, the final salary will depend on experience and qualifications.
Title of Position Supervisor
Manager
Posting Type
Internal & External
Dependent on Funding
Yes
Additional Information
This position is contingent upon the continued availability of external funding.
To perform this job successfully, an individual must be able to perform each essential duty satisfactorily. The requirements listed are representative of the knowledge, skill, and/or ability required. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions.
If you require any auxiliary aids, services, or accommodations during Michigan Tech’s hiring process please notify the Human Resources office at 906-487-2280 or [email protected].
Other Conditions of Employment:
Please note that successful applicants are responsible for ensuring their eligibility to work in the United States (i.e. a citizen or national of the United States, a lawful permanent resident, a foreign national authorized to work in the United States without the need of an employer sponsorship) on or before the effective date of your appointment, and maintain eligibility without sponsorship throughout your appointment.
Michigan Technological University is an Equal Opportunity Educational Institution/Equal Opportunity Employer that provides equal opportunity for all, including protected veterans and individuals with disabilities.
The Annual Security and Fire Safety Report contains current campus safety and disciplinary policies, crime statistics for the previous 3 calendar years, and on-campus student housing fire safety policies and fire statistics for the previous 3 calendar years. Michigan Tech will provide a paper copy upon request; please contact the Michigan Tech Public Safety.
In compliance with the federal Drug-Free Schools and Communities Act (DFSCA) and its implementing regulations (34 CFR Part 86), Michigan Tech is committed to maintaining a drugfree campus environment and actively promoting the health and safety of its community.
Required Education, Certifications, Licensures* (minimum requirements)
Advertised: 30 Sep 2026 Eastern Daylight Time
Applications Close:
Salary Context
This $104K-$115K range is in the lower quartile for Research Engineer roles in our dataset (median: $191K across 47 roles with salary data).
View full Research Engineer salary data →Role Details
About This Role
Research Engineers bridge the gap between research and production. They implement papers, build experiment infrastructure, optimize training pipelines, and make research prototypes production-ready. They're the engineers who make research work at scale.
The role sits at a unique intersection. You need to understand the math well enough to implement novel architectures correctly, and you need the engineering chops to make them run efficiently on distributed systems. When a research scientist has a breakthrough idea, you're the person who turns it from a notebook prototype into a training pipeline that runs on 256 GPUs.
Across the 8,943 AI roles we're tracking, Research Engineer positions make up 3% of the market. At Michigan Technological University, this role fits into their broader AI and engineering organization.
Research Engineer roles are growing as AI labs recognize that research velocity depends on engineering quality. The role is less competitive than Research Scientist (no PhD required), but the bar for engineering skill is very high. These roles are concentrated at major labs and well-funded startups.
What the Work Looks Like
A typical week involves: implementing a new attention mechanism from a recent paper, profiling and optimizing a training pipeline that's bottlenecked on data loading, building evaluation infrastructure for a new benchmark, debugging distributed training issues across a GPU cluster, and pair-programming with a research scientist on their latest experiment. The work is deeply technical.
Research Engineer roles are growing as AI labs recognize that research velocity depends on engineering quality. The role is less competitive than Research Scientist (no PhD required), but the bar for engineering skill is very high. These roles are concentrated at major labs and well-funded startups.
Skills in Demand for This Role
Strong software engineering fundamentals plus ML knowledge. Python, C++, and CUDA experience are common requirements. You'll need to read papers and turn ideas into working code. Distributed systems experience (especially distributed training) is highly valued. Performance optimization skills separate great candidates from good ones.
Experience with large-scale training infrastructure (FSDP, DeepSpeed, Megatron), GPU programming (CUDA, Triton), and the internals of ML frameworks (PyTorch internals, custom autograd functions) is what makes candidates stand out. The best research engineers can debug issues that span the full stack from GPU memory management to numerical precision to algorithmic correctness.
Strong postings mention the team's recent research, the infrastructure scale, and the specific technical challenges. They often list the research areas you'd support. Look for roles that emphasize both implementation quality and research understanding.
Compensation Benchmarks
Research Engineer roles pay a median of $252,000 based on 419 positions with disclosed compensation. Senior-level AI roles across all categories have a median of $228,700. This role's midpoint ($110K) sits 56% below the category median. Disclosed range: $104K to $115K.
Across all AI roles, the market median is $213,380. Top-quartile compensation starts at $264,148. The 90th percentile reaches $319,310. For comparison, the highest-paying categories include AI Safety ($253,100) and AI Engineering Manager ($251,622). By seniority level: Entry: $110,408; Mid: $193,200; Senior: $228,700; Director: $272,250; VP: $235,000.
Michigan Technological University AI Hiring
Michigan Technological University has 1 open AI role right now. They're hiring across Research Engineer. Based in MI, US. Compensation range: $115K - $115K.
Location Context
Across all AI roles, 6% (521 positions) offer remote work, while 8,351 require on-site attendance. Top AI hiring metros: New York (2,878 roles, $221,000 median); San Francisco (2,416 roles, $263,811 median); Los Angeles (1,340 roles, $210,000 median).
Career Path
Common paths into Research Engineer roles include Software Engineer, ML Engineer, Research Intern.
From here, career progression typically leads toward Senior Research Engineer, Research Scientist, ML Architect.
This is one of the best entry points into AI research without a PhD. Build a strong engineering portfolio with ML projects, contribute to open-source ML frameworks, and demonstrate that you can implement complex ideas correctly and efficiently. The transition to Research Scientist is possible with published first-author work, which some research engineer roles support.
What to Expect in Interviews
Technical screens test both engineering skill and research understanding. Expect coding rounds with performance-critical implementations (GPU optimization, efficient data loading). Be prepared to discuss papers relevant to the team's research area and explain how you'd implement key ideas. System design questions focus on training infrastructure: distributed training, experiment tracking, and compute resource management.
When evaluating opportunities: Strong postings mention the team's recent research, the infrastructure scale, and the specific technical challenges. They often list the research areas you'd support. Look for roles that emphasize both implementation quality and research understanding.
AI Hiring Overview
The AI job market has 8,943 open positions tracked in our dataset. By seniority: 175 entry-level, 4,132 mid-level, 3,268 senior, and 1,368 leadership roles (Director, VP, C-Level). Remote roles make up 6% of the market (521 positions). The remaining 8,351 roles require on-site or hybrid attendance.
The market median for AI roles is $213,380. Top-quartile compensation starts at $264,148. The 90th percentile reaches $319,310. Highest-paying categories: AI Safety ($253,100 median, 57 roles); Research Engineer ($252,000 median, 419 roles); AI Engineering Manager ($251,622 median, 51 roles).
Research Engineer roles are growing as AI labs recognize that research velocity depends on engineering quality. The role is less competitive than Research Scientist (no PhD required), but the bar for engineering skill is very high. These roles are concentrated at major labs and well-funded startups.
The AI Job Market Today
The AI job market spans 8,943 open positions across 16 role categories. The largest categories by volume: AI/ML Engineer (6,739), AI Product Manager (403), AI Software Engineer (402). These three account for the majority of open positions, though smaller categories often have higher per-role compensation because of specialized skill requirements.
The seniority mix tells a story about where AI teams are in their maturity. Entry-level roles (175) are outnumbered by mid-level (4,132) and senior (3,268) positions, reflecting that most companies are past the 'build a team from scratch' phase and need experienced engineers who can ship production systems. Leadership roles (Director, VP, C-Level) total 1,368 positions, representing the bottleneck between technical execution and organizational strategy.
Remote work availability sits at 6% of all AI roles (521 positions), with 8,351 requiring on-site or hybrid attendance. The remote share has stabilized after the post-pandemic correction. Senior and specialized roles (Research Scientist, ML Architect) are more likely to be remote-eligible than entry-level positions, partly because experienced hires have more negotiating power and partly because these roles require less hands-on mentorship.
AI compensation is structured in clear tiers. The market median sits at $213,380. Top-quartile roles start at $264,148, and the 90th percentile reaches $319,310. These figures include base salary with disclosed compensation. Total compensation (including equity, bonuses, and sign-on) runs 20-40% higher at companies that offer those components.
Category matters for compensation. AI Safety roles lead at $253,100 median, while Prompt Engineer roles sit at $141,440. The spread between highest and lowest-paying categories reflects the premium on specialized technical skills versus broader analytical roles.
The most in-demand skills across all AI postings: Python (1,422 postings), Aws (808 postings), Azure (638 postings), Rag (555 postings), Gcp (457 postings), Pytorch (433 postings), Claude (341 postings), Kubernetes (337 postings). Python dominates, appearing in the vast majority of role descriptions regardless of category. Cloud platform experience (AWS, GCP, Azure) is the second most common requirement. The newer entrants to the top skills list (RAG, vector databases, LLM APIs) reflect the shift from traditional ML toward generative AI applications.
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