Optical Scientist - DSR

Job Title

Optical Scientist - DSR

Role Summary

Join the Advanced Photonics team within Display Systems Research (DSR) to design, simulate, build, and validate nano-photonic components and near-eye display architectures for AR/VR systems. The role partners with cross-functional teams across optics, materials, fabrication, and software to move research toward product-ready technologies.

Experience Level

Senior - typically requires 8+ years of relevant industry or research experience (per posting minimums).

Responsibilities

Work across device, component, and system levels to advance immersive displays, sensing, and optical-compute technologies. Key responsibilities include:

• Design and model component technologies and system architectures for near-eye display combiners, novel sensors, and optical compute.
• Develop and improve simulation, optimization, and design workflows and algorithms for future photonic technologies.
• Build, prototype, and validate nanophotonic devices and demonstrate performance through testing and metrology.
• Collaborate with teams in computation, optics, chemistry, materials science, process development, and integration to identify gaps and deploy solutions.

Requirements

Must-have technical skills and experience (concise):

• 8+ years experience in optical design using tools such as Lumerical, Virtual Lab, FRED, LightTools, Zemax, or CODE V.
• 8+ years experience in scientific programming and data analysis (MATLAB, Python, C++, or similar).
• 8+ years working with light propagation methods in wave and ray domains, including mixed models and optimization algorithm development.
• Experience with wave optics, geometric optics, polarization, and coherence.
• 8+ years experience with electromagnetic modeling and analysis of nanoscale structures, anisotropic/non-linear/switchable materials, or holographic elements.
• 8+ years experience in fabrication and functional testing of novel photonic devices (metastructures, photonic integrated circuits, holographic/diffractive/refractive structures).

Nice-to-have:

• Experience with optical metrology (interferometry, image-quality testing) and advanced metrology toolchains.
• Experience applying machine learning or deep learning to nano-optics design and simulation workflows.
• Experience building simulation tools for distributed systems and parallel computing.

Education Requirements

PhD in Optical Sciences, Physics, Electrical Engineering, or a related field, or equivalent practical experience.

About the Company

Company: Meta Platforms

Headquarters: Menlo Park, California, United States

American technology company that develops social networking products (Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp) and invests in virtual/augmented reality hardware and software through Reality Labs, focusing on connectivity, advertising, and immersive computing experiences.