Principal OR Sr. Principal Guidance Navigation Controls Engineer

About the role

Northrop Grumman’s Aeronautics Systems – Research & Advanced Design (R&AD) transforms breakthrough ideas into mission-ready capabilities through intelligent anticipation. We’re the front-end design engine, defining what comes next. From developing cutting-edge next-generation future aircraft to trailblazing collaborative autonomous platforms, we push the boundaries of technology and forge industry-leading partnerships that set new standards for what’s possible.

Responsibilities

• Support research and development of flight control algorithms for manned and unmanned air vehicles.
• Design, develop, implement, verify, and test algorithms, software, and simulation tools to perform guidance, navigation and control (GNC) of autonomous unmanned aircraft.
• Develop control laws to meet air vehicle performance, flying qualities, and stability margin requirements, both on ground and in flight.
• Design outer and inner loop control laws, and associated logic and autonomy functions.
• Develop air vehicle system linear and non-linear dynamic simulation models and integrate models into software and hardware-in-the-loop simulation environments.
• Perform performance and flying qualities analysis.
• Support non-linear simulation and hardware-in-the-loop lab testing.
• Support flight test activities and analyze air vehicle flight test data.
• Develop analysis to support design reviews at different stages in a development program, such as PDR, CDR, etc.

Requirements

• For Principal GNC Engineer: Bachelor's degree in a related Science, Technology, Engineering or Mathematics (STEM) discipline with 5 years of relevant, professional engineering experience; OR Master’s degree in a related STEM discipline with 3 years of relevant, professional engineering experience; OR a PhD in a related STEM discipline with 1 year of relevant, professional engineering experience.
• For Senior Principal GNC Engineer: Bachelor's degree in a related Science, Technology, Engineering or Mathematics (STEM) discipline with 8 years of relevant, professional engineering experience; OR Master’s degree in a related STEM discipline with 6 years of relevant, professional engineering experience; OR a PhD in a related STEM discipline with 4 years of relevant, professional engineering experience.

Qualifications

• Experience with fixed-wing aircraft flight dynamics.
• Experience using linear control principles and tools to design feedback control systems.
• Experience analyzing non-linear simulations of aircraft closed-loop dynamics.
• Working knowledge of autopilot functions and outer/inner loop control law performance requirements.
• Experience using MATLAB to create, process, analyze, and visually represent data.
• Experience using Simulink to model dynamic systems.
• Working knowledge of logic, modes, and states for autonomous aircraft.
• Ability and willingness to travel up to 20% of the time.
• Ability to obtain a US Government Secret security clearance or higher and Special Program Access (SAP).

Skills

• Experience designing control laws for fixed wing aircraft and performing handling qualities analysis.
• Experience with autonomy algorithms (Autonomous Taxi/ Take Off and Landing, etc.) for driving control laws.
• Familiarity with Simulink Stateflow Modeling and autocoding Simulink models.
• Experience with C/C++, Python, and Lua script programming.

Pay

• Primary Level Salary Range: $114,000.00 - $171,000.00
• Secondary Level Salary Range: $142,200.00 - $213,400.00

Schedule

• Travel: Yes, 25% of the Time