{"id":705261,"url":"https://alion.io/job/inversionspace-staff-aerothermal-cfd-methods-engineer","title":"Staff Aerothermal CFD Methods Engineer","company":{"id":678249,"name":"Inversion","domain":"inversionspace.com","url":"https://alion.io/company/inversionspace","size_band":"51-200","is_staffing_agency":false,"employer_type":"direct","is_intermediary":false,"listed_via":null,"ats_vendor":"Greenhouse","truth_index":{"grade":"A","score":93,"open_postings":86,"ghost_share":0.035,"stale_share":0,"repost_share":0,"time_to_fill_p50_days":91,"computed_at":"2026-11-08T05:47:12Z"}},"role":"Aerospace","role_family":"Aerospace","seniority":"staff","employment_type":null,"work_mode":"on_site","remote_scope":null,"remote_scope_basis":null,"remote_working_hours":null,"hiring_geo_confidence":"structured","locations":["Vista, United States"],"countries":["US"],"hiring_countries":[],"hiring_countries_total":0,"salary":{"min":161000,"max":221000,"currency":"USD","period":"year","gross":null,"usd_annual":221000},"salary_estimate":null,"experience_years_min":9,"visa_sponsorship":false,"relocation_package":false,"has_equity":false,"technologies":[{"name":"C++","optional":false},{"name":"Fortran","optional":false},{"name":"HPC","optional":false},{"name":"MPI","optional":false},{"name":"C","optional":true}],"status":"live","first_seen_at":"2026-08-13T05:07:04Z","employer_posted_date":"2026-09-25","last_verified_at":"2026-11-08T10:42:46Z","board_verified":true,"closed_at":null,"days_open":87,"trust":{"level":"ok","repost_count":0,"flags":["company_stale"],"days_open":87},"description":"Advanced Reentry Technologies\nWho We Are:\n\nInversion is an aerospace and defense company pioneering advanced reentry technology to enable next-generation capabilities from space. By combining high-performance materials, precision aerodynamics, and mission-driven autonomy, Inversion is transforming reentry into an operational capability for an entirely new class of missions.\nThe company’s highly maneuverable reentry spacecraft, Arc, is designed for rapid global cargo delivery, hypersonic testing, and other national security missions that require precise, controlled flight through the atmosphere. Arc creates an entirely new transportation domain, unlocking unprecedented speed and global reach.\nHeadquartered in Los Angeles, Inversion designs, manufactures, and integrates its spacecraft under one roof, enabling the company to move rapidly from concept to flight. The company is backed by leading investors including Y Combinator, Spark Capital, and Lockheed Martin Ventures, with customers across the U.S. government and commercial space industry.\nPosition Overview:\nThe aerothermal environments that Inversion's vehicles fly through push beyond what off-the-shelf analysis tools can characterize. As the Staff Aerothermal CFD Methods Engineer, you will build and extend the computational tools our aerothermal team depends on developing new physics models, numeric's, and solver capabilities rather than simply applying existing ones. A meaningful portion of this work will involve developing extensions to US3D. \nKey Responsibilities: \nBuild and extend the computational tools used to characterize the aerothermal environment around reentry vehicles.\nDevelop, implement, and validate extensions to existing high enthalpy flow solvers, spanning physics models, numerical methods, and solver infrastructure.\nImplement and improve models of high-temperature gas dynamics, including thermochemical non-equilibrium and finite-rate chemistry including ablation products or other additional species present in flow.\nDevelop multi-phase flow modeling capability with an emphasis on droplet interactions atomization and breakup, evaporation, droplet-shock and droplet-surface interaction, and two-way coupling between dispersed and continuous phases.\nVerify and validate new capabilities against analytical solutions, ground test, and flight data.\nWork closely with production aerothermal analysts to harden new capabilities into reliable, documented tools.\nMentor engineers across the aerothermal team.\nRequired Qualifications: \nBachelor's degree in Aerospace or Mechanical Engineering, Applied Mathematics, Physics, or equivalent experience in a related field.\nTypically, 9+ years of experience developing CFD methods and solver capabilities.\nExperience writing, extending or modifying high-enthalpy CFD solvers.\nExperience modeling high-temperature gas dynamics and chemistry, including thermochemical non-equilibrium.\nExperience modeling multi-phase flows with an emphasis on droplet interactions - such as spray atomization and breakup modeling for fuel injection systems, or coolant droplet modeling for turbine engines.\nStrong fundamentals in numerical methods for compressible flow, including finite volume discretization, shock capturing, and implicit solution methods.\nProficiency in compiled scientific programming languages such as Fortran, C, or C++.\nProven ability to work effectively in a fast-paced environment, including prototyping and rapid iteration of new products.\nMust have the ability to obtain and maintain a U.S. government Secret/Top Secret security clearance. \nDesired Qualifications: \nPhD in Aerospace or Mechanical Engineering, Applied Mathematics, or a related field.\nFamiliarity with both Lagrangian and Eulerian approaches to particle tracking as well as experience with droplet breakup and dispersion models (e.g., KH-RT, TAB).\nExperience with Fortran, particularly in the context of extending existing solver codebases.\nDirect experience with US3D, including extension through user-defined subroutines.\nExperience with plasma simulation for weakly ionized flows and / or experience with electromagnetic simulation.\nExperience with parallel scientific computing (e.g., MPI) on large-scale HPC systems.\nPrior experience working in startups and/or small independent teams.\nOur office headquarters is located in Playa Vista, CA. This position requires in-office presence. \nThe California annual base salary for this role is currently $161,000-$221,000. Pay Grades are determined by role, level, location, and alignment with market data. Individual pay will be determined on a case-by-case basis and may vary based on the following considerations: interviews and an assessment of several factors that are unique to each candidate, job-related skills, relevant education and experience, certifications, abilities of the candidate and internal equity. \nITAR Compliance:\nTo conform to U.S. Government space technology export regulations, including the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) you must be a U.S. citizen, lawful permanent resident of the U.S., protected individual as defined by 8 U.S.C. 1324b(a)(3), or eligible to obtain the required authorizations from the U.S. Department of State. Learn more about the ITAR here. \nEqual Employment Opportunity:\nInversion provides equal employment opportunities to all employees and applicants without regard to race, color, religion, age, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, national origin, veteran status, or disability. \nInversion collects and processes personal data in accordance with applicable data protection laws. If you are a US Job Applicant see the CCPA Privacy Policy Notice for further details.","description_format":"text","description_chars":5704,"description_truncated":false,"requirements":{"experience_years_min":9,"management_years_min":null,"team_size_min":null,"manages_managers":false,"education":{"level":"bachelor","optional":false},"security_clearance":true,"languages":[]},"benefits":["Equity"],"hiring_locations":[{"name":"United States","iso":"US","kind":"country"}],"hiring_excludes":[],"relocation_offered":false,"industries":["Space Services","Space Defense"],"lifecycle":[{"event":"open","at":"2026-09-11T03:44:23Z"}],"visa":[],"liveness":{"score":51,"band":"ok","label":"Likely open","p_open":1,"p_active":0.856,"p_room":0.6,"age_days":87,"expected_fill_days":91,"reasons":["conf:2","velocity","win:late","crowd:"],"computed_at":"2026-11-08T05:47:12Z"},"pay":{"stated_usd_annual":221000,"is_top_pay":false},"html_url":"https://alion.io/job/inversionspace-staff-aerothermal-cfd-methods-engineer","json_url":"https://alion.io/job/inversionspace-staff-aerothermal-cfd-methods-engineer.json","meta":{"generated_at":"2026-11-08T11:08:17Z","cache_seconds":300,"methodology":"https://alion.io/methodology","terms":"https://alion.io/terms","contact":"https://alion.io/contact","api":"https://alion.io/developers","about":"Alion is a live layer of people, companies and AI agents: who they are, whether they are real and active right now, what they do and how to work with them, readable by people and by agents and paid per call.","catalog":"https://alion.io/catalog.json","usage":{"tier":"crawler_verified","counted_by":"address","units_charged":1,"used_today":23934,"day_limit":null,"remaining_today":null,"minute_limit":300,"resets_at":"2026-11-09T00:00:00Z"}},"offers":[{"id":"company.slices","title":"One company in depth, by slice","status":"live","price":{"credits":0.02,"usd":0.002,"plus_per_slice":{"credits":0.05,"usd":0.005}},"unit":"per company, plus each slice with data","note":"the employer in depth","call":{"mcp_tool":"get_company","arguments":{"id":678249},"rest":"https://alion.io/mcp/rest/get_company?id=678249"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=company.slices&for=job%2Finversionspace-staff-aerothermal-cfd-methods-engineer"},{"id":"market.stats","title":"A market slice: pay, demand and time to fill","status":"live","price":{"credits":1,"usd":0.1},"unit":"per slice","note":"pay, demand and time to fill for this role and place","call":{"mcp_tool":"market_stats"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=market.stats&for=job%2Finversionspace-staff-aerothermal-cfd-methods-engineer"},{"id":"job.search","title":"Open jobs by role, technology, place, pay and visa","status":"live","price":{"credits":0.02,"usd":0.002},"unit":"per posting in a list","note":"similar open postings","call":{"mcp_tool":"search_jobs"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=job.search&for=job%2Finversionspace-staff-aerothermal-cfd-methods-engineer"},{"id":"company.verify","title":"Is this company real and active right now","status":"pilot","price":null,"unit":"per company","request":{"url":"https://alion.io/catalog/request","method":"POST","body":"{\"offer\": \"company.verify\", \"for\": \"job/inversionspace-staff-aerothermal-cfd-methods-engineer\", \"note\": \"what you need it for\"}"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=company.verify&for=job%2Finversionspace-staff-aerothermal-cfd-methods-engineer"}],"agent":{"mcp":"https://alion.io/mcp/jobs","mcp_open":"https://alion.io/mcp/open","next":[{"tool":"get_job","arguments":{"id":705261}},{"tool":"search_jobs","arguments":{"company":"inversionspace.com","detail":"compact"}},{"tool":"match_people","arguments":{"job_id":705261},"note":"people open to offers who fit this vacancy"}],"note":"The same data through MCP tools: https://alion.io/mcp/open needs no sign-in (compact searches, postings, people); https://alion.io/mcp with an Alion account has everything. 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