Engineer in charge of the acquisition and detector integration

Located on the Paris-Saclay plateau, about 20 kilometers from the capital, the SOLEIL synchrotron is one of France's leading research facilities. Since it began operating in 2008, it has served the national and international scientific communities. Research conducted at SOLEIL covers a wide range of scientific and industrial fields — including physics, biology, chemistry, materials science, environmental science, Earth sciences, and cultural and natural heritage — all connected to current societal challenges. Experiments carried out on the beamlines rely on the use of synchrotron light emitted by electrons accelerated to nearly the speed of light within a storage ring. SOLEIL is jointly supervised by the CNRS and the CEA and offers its staff a dynamic, innovative, multidisciplinary, and international working environment.

At the forefront of technology, SOLEIL II is an ambitious project designed to provide new opportunities for scientific and industrial research. SOLEIL II consists of a major upgrade of the existing infrastructure and aims to significantly improve the performance of electron accelerators and beamlines. It is designed to address major current and future societal challenges, particularly in areas such as advanced materials research, energy and sustainable development, health and well-being, and the environment.

Construction work on the SOLEIL II project began in 2024, marking the start of a phase of development and technological innovation. In parallel, the existing facility will remain operational until the fall of 2028. SOLEIL II is scheduled to start operations in 2030, with a gradual ramp-up phase continuing until 2035.

Context and missions

In this role, you will work with the other engineers in charge of the acquisition and detector integration, providing expertise in defining and developing the overall architecture including electronic platforms and software used for accelerators and beamlines requirements.

As part of the project team, you will be involved in the development of embedded firmware and software to achieved performing integration into our TANGO framework (https://www.tango-controls.org/).

You will be responsible for the development of the following:

• PAndABox (https://ohwr.org/project/pandabox/-/wikis/home) as part of an international collaboration.
• MicroTCA platform

You will lead R&D and feedback analysis from projects to propose innovative and competitive solutions, particularly in the field of FPGA and/or GPU for processing acceleration.

The acquisition systems developed will be integrated into the microservices architecture of SOLEIL's information system and will be closely coupled with the HPC systems.

In this role, you will interact with engineers and scientists from the accelerators and beamline to manage the development of the systems from the specifications, through development up to operational validation.

Profile 

The candidate must hold an engineering degree in digital electronics (or equivalent university degree) with 3 to 5 years of professional experience in developing numerical systems

For this position, the ideal candidate will have the following skills:

• Digital electronics
• Embedded systems: SOC Xilinx, Linux Yocto, edge computing, IoT
• Programming languages: VHDL, C, C++, Python for digital processing
• Knowledge of distributed software architecture
• Fluent in English for writing technical documents, scientific papers and conference presentations.
• Additional skills: automatic control, signal processing, image processing, embedded AI.

Personal qualities required for successful integration into the team:

• Team spirit
• Autonomy, rigour, curiosity, creativity
• Caring, a good listener and a sense of service
• Analytical and reporting skills

Working Conditions

If you are looking for a position in a company that values scientific excellence and technological innovation, SOLEIL offers you the opportunity to:

• Work in an innovative, multidisciplinary, and multicultural research laboratory,
• Be at the heart of the dynamic research and development environment of Paris-Saclay,
• Collaborate with national and international experts in various scientific and technical fields,
• Enjoy the proximity to Paris, located only 25 km away, to discover its rich cultural heritage and dynamic lifestyle,
• Undertake short trips within France or Europe.

Benetits :

• 26 days of paid vacation + up to 2 extra days + 23 RTT days per full working year, based on a 40-hour workweek.
• Mandatory health insurance (basic plan) costs 19.35 euros per month for the employee (174.15 euros cost for the employer, covering 90% of the contribution), including family members (spouse + children).
• We offer optional supplementary health insurance for your family (partner + children) at 26,69 euros.
• Benefit from a welfare system that supplements mandatory Social Security benefits, often insufficient. It compensates for lost income in case of inability to work, ensuring the standard of living for the insured and their family in difficult circumstances: death, incapacity to work, or disability due to illness or accident.
• Possibility to open a Time Savings Account (CET) after one year of seniority: The CET allows you to accumulate earned rest days in view of compensating for leave, buying back retirement insurance quarters, funding an enterprise savings plan (PEE) and/or a collective retirement savings plan (PERCO), and monetizing acquired days. Employer’s complementary contribution to the retirement savings plan (PERCO).
• On-site company restaurant at SOLEIL, with subsidized meals (cost for the employee ranges from approximately 3.30 euros to 6.75 euros, depending on salary scale).
• Family benefits according to different situations: family bonus, additional leave in certain situations, wedding, and birth bonuses...
• Social and cultural activities offered by SOLEIL's Social and Economic Committee (CSE).