Microfabrication Scientist I/II

Location: Cambridge, MA USA

Department: Autonomous Science Platform

Your Impact at LILA

As a Microfabrication Scientist on the Vacuum Synthesis team at Lila Sciences, you will serve as the primary contributor to the fabrication of prototype devices used to probe and characterize the properties of novel materials. Your hands-on expertise in cleanroom processing, with strengths in thin-film deposition, lithography, etching, and metrology, will contribute directly to Lila’s materials science programs focused on the predictive design of novel material families and functional thin-film systems.

In this role, you will design and build prototype test structures and devices that enable rapid and accurate assessment of material properties. Development of fabrication process flows may include non-standard approaches that shape how the platform builds and interrogates new material systems. The experimental outputs will feed directly into closed-loop discovery campaigns.

You will partner with materials scientists, device physicists, systems engineers, and machine learning scientists to develop and execute fabrication campaigns with high scientific rigor and velocity.

What Youll Be Building

• Design and fabricate prototype devices and test structures used to evaluate novel materials.
• Develop, optimize, and troubleshoot thin-film deposition recipes across diverse material systems.
• Execute cleanroom processes, including lithography, wet/dry etching, and thin-film deposition.
• Characterize films and devices using profilometry, ellipsometry, SEM, and electrical probing.
• Integrate fabrication processes into automated and high-throughput workflows.
• Translate experimental goals into manufacturable process steps with materials scientists and engineers.

What Youll Need to Succeed

• Bachelor’s degree in Materials Science, Electrical Engineering, Chemical Engineering, Physics, or a closely related field; advanced degree (M.S. or Ph.D.) preferred.
• 5+ years of hands-on cleanroom experience in research, development, or manufacturing.
• Deep expertise in thin-film deposition, including recipe development and troubleshooting.
• Proficiency across photolithography, wet/dry etching, and thin-film deposition.
• Hands-on experience with metrology and characterization tools as part of process development.
• Track record implementing novel fabrication process flows when established recipes do not fit.

Bonus Points For

• Experience with epitaxial deposition techniques.
• Experience with device fabrication for electronic, photonic, MEMS, spintronic, or quantum applications.
• Proficiency in lift-off patterning and process selection for device and material requirements.
• Familiarity with high-throughput or combinatorial fabrication process integration.
• Proficiency in Python for scientific data analysis.