Senior Ontologist

About the role

The Threat Analytic Systems (QAI) Group at APL seeks talented staff to provide groundbreaking capabilities that bridge the gaps between data, real-world events, and prediction of events of national importance. We are looking for individuals who are passionate about building solutions for our greatest national security challenges.

Responsibilities

• Work on a team with software engineers and data scientists to build ontologies and capabilities for applied national security mission needs.
• Provide expert evaluation and review of ontology content.
• Engage stakeholders to determine ontology requirements.
• Craft ontology content with subject matter experts.
• Contribute to and implement quality assurance and validation practices.

Qualifications

• Master's degree in a field relevant to Ontology (Philosophy, Computer Science, Cognitive Science, Public / Social Policy, Mathematics, Logic, or Linguistics).
• Proficient with OWL, RDFs, RDF, SPARQL.
• Experience building domain ontologies based on a top-level ontology.
• Able to weigh tradeoffs between semantic expressivity and project-specific implementation strategies.
• Familiarity with Python.
• Experience with ontology editors (TopBraid Composer, Protégé, ROBOT), or ontology editing software packages (rdflib, Apache Jena, Sesame, RDF4J).
• Experience with formal representations of logical reasoning and inference.
• Strong problem-solving, analytical, and organizational skills.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills.
• Ability to obtain a TS/SCI level security clearance.

Preferred Qualifications

• PhD in a field relevant to Ontology (Philosophy, Computer Science, Cognitive Science, Public / Social Policy, Mathematics, Logic, or Linguistics).
• Experience working with a software engineering team to deliver ontology-driven software features.
• Experience with BFO, CCO, SOSA/SSN, OBO Foundry, and other semantic web standards.
• Experience with triple stores or graph databases (GraphDB, Stardog, Jena Fuseki).
• Experience with AI tools to generate high-quality ontology content.
• Experience developing AI tools that use ontologies or knowledge graphs.
• Experience with SHACL, SPIN.
• Experience with software version management using GIT.
• Experience with machine learning, natural language processing, or normalization/integration of heterogeneous data sources.
• Coursework in data structures, databases, metaphysics, knowledge representation, algorithms, mathematical logic, mereotopology, or software programming.

Benefits

APL offers a comprehensive benefits package including retirement plans, paid time off, medical, dental, vision, life insurance, short-term disability, long-term disability, flexible spending accounts, education assistance, and training and development. APL also provides a healthy work/life balance and a vibrant, welcoming atmosphere where you can bring your authentic self to work.

Pay

$100,000 - $245,000 Annually

Schedule

Full-time