Inversion Space
Staff Aerothermal CFD Methods Engineer
$161K–$221K
Playa Vista, California, United States · Staff · Full-time · Posted Aug 13, 2026
- Experience
- Typically 9+ years developing CFD methods and solver capabilities.
- Education
- Bachelor’s degree in Aerospace or Mechanical Engineering, Applied Mathematics, Physics, or equivalent experience in a related field.
- Visa sponsorship
- 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 required authorizations from the U.S. Department of State for ITAR compliance.
About the job
Develops and validates computational fluid dynamics methods and solver capabilities to characterize aerothermal environments around reentry vehicles.
What you'll do
- Build and extend high-enthalpy flow solvers, including physics models, numerical methods, and solver infrastructure.
- Develop and validate models for high-temperature gas dynamics, chemistry, and multiphase droplet flows.
- Verify new capabilities against analytical solutions, ground tests, and flight data; document and harden tools, and mentor engineers.
What they ask for
- Bachelor’s degree in Aerospace or Mechanical Engineering, Applied Mathematics, Physics, or equivalent experience in a related field.
- Experience writing, extending, or modifying high-enthalpy CFD solvers and modeling high-temperature gas dynamics and chemistry, including thermochemical non-equilibrium.
- Experience modeling multiphase flows, especially droplet interactions; strong numerical methods fundamentals for compressible flow.
- Proficiency in compiled scientific programming languages such as Fortran, C, or C++; ability to obtain and maintain a U.S. government Secret/Top Secret security clearance.
Nice to have
- PhD in Aerospace or Mechanical Engineering, Applied Mathematics, or a related field; direct experience with US3D.
- Experience with particle-tracking and droplet models, plasma or electromagnetic simulation, parallel scientific computing on HPC systems, or startups and small teams.
Pay
$161,000-$221,000 USD base salary
Tools
US3D, Fortran, C, C++, MPI, KH-RT, TAB
Model-written summary · the original posting is authoritative