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Space Principal/Sr. Principal Engineer Systems - Computer Based Control Systems

Northrop Grumman
VAMC01, United States, United Statesfull_timeVerifiedPosted 5 Feb 2026
💰 $213,400/yr($114,000/yr$213,400/yr)

About the role

RELOCATION ASSISTANCE: No relocation assistance available

CLEARANCE TYPE: None

TRAVEL: No

Description

At Northrop Grumman, our employees have incredible opportunities to work on revolutionary systems that impact people's lives around the world today, and for generations to come. Our pioneering and inventive spirit has enabled us to be at the forefront of many technological advancements in our nation's history - from the first flight across the Atlantic Ocean, to stealth bombers, to landing on the moon. We look for people who have bold new ideas, courage and a pioneering spirit to join forces to invent the future, and have fun along the way. Our culture thrives on intellectual curiosity, cognitive diversity and bringing your whole self to work — and we have an insatiable drive to do what others think is impossible. Our employees are not only part of history, they're making history.

This Systems Engineering position is an engineering support role for Computer Based Control Systems (CBCS) on the Habitat and Logistics Outpost (HALO) program located in McLean, VA focusing in Fault Tolerant Computing as well as Command and Data Handling. The candidate must be able to assist in the formulation of avionics hardware and software system design, definition of concept of operations, and systems analysis. The candidate will have responsibility for coordinating between engineering subsystems and with integration and test engineers for the successful design, implementation, and test of the avionics aspects of a space system. The candidate will serve as a team member and/or CBCS lead depending on experience and skills. The candidate must be able to assist in the formulation of system design, definition of concept of operations, and systems analysis. Responsibilities will also include interaction with program, functional and customer leadership.

 

In this role, the candidate will perform general systems engineering duties related to CBCS, which may include requirements flow down, tracking, verification, and the writing of specifications, interface control documents, and engineering reports from advanced studies, special engineering investigations, and similar activities. Tasks may also include assisting with Command & Telemetry database development and validation of its content. A successful candidate will have familiarity with some or all of the following: design and review of flight software, flight operating systems, memory management and radiation mitigations, hardware / software interactions, management of budgets / utilization.  The candidate must be deeply knowledgeable in aerospace systems, spacecraft subsystems design, or mission operations.  Position will also include responsibilities relating to integration, testing, and operational readiness of spacecraft and payloads.  Candidate may be called on to assist in new business activities, such as conceptual design and analysis for proposals and funded studies, and may include authoring sections for both.

 

The candidate will develop original ideas, elaborate on preliminary design concepts, evaluate completed designs with their program/functional supervisors and other technical groups, and make the necessary design modifications to achieve the best design within the program constraints. The candidate may also develop and coordinate the conduct of test programs required to evaluate design work.

 

Duties:

  • Evaluate design documentation and verification plans for compliance with customer and internally derived requirements at module and software subsystem levels.

  • Design software architecture and ConOps for one or more of the following software functions: Command and Data Handling, Data Storage, General SW functions.

  • Write technical documentation, verification plans and test reports for spacecraft avionics software.

  • Support software build creation and suite management including generating roadmaps for SW ConOps and implementation.

  • Develop and execute integrated avionics software validation testing based on defined verification criteria.

  • Provide systems engineering support for technical performance reviews, analyses, and reports.

  • Provide support for development of MOPS scripts.

 

Basic Qualifications:

  • Principal Systems Engineer - Bachelors of Science degree in technical field and 5+ years of experience, or Masters of Science degree in technical field with 3+ years of

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Company

Northrop Grumman

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