Bio-Systems Engineer
Design, integration, and reliability of the PhytoSense Mesh, Mycelial Data Fabric, and CHLORA automation stack that keeps the facility alive and contained.
Role Summary
The Bio-Systems Engineer owns the technology that senses, decides, and actuates across the greenhouse grid. The role spans three coupled systems: the PhytoSense Mesh (distributed plant-health sensing), the Mycelial Data Fabric (MDF) (the facility data and comms backbone), and CHLORA (the cultivation/response automation assistant). The engineer designs sensor and actuation subsystems, integrates them through the MDF, tunes CHLORA's control loops and alert thresholds, and is accountable for the reliability of the telemetry that every cultivation and containment decision depends on. When the mesh degrades, the facility loses its eyes — so this role carries a formal on-call rotation and a hard reliability mandate.
Key Responsibilities
- Design, deploy, and maintain PhytoSense Mesh sensor nodes — sap-flow, turgor, VOC, and fluorescence — and calibrate them against the standards in Botanical Tracking Metrics.
- Engineer and operate the Mycelial Data Fabric integration layer: telemetry ingestion, time-series storage, redundancy, and sub-second alert routing.
- Configure and tune CHLORA control loops (irrigation, climate, dosing) and alert thresholds; validate changes in a staged environment before production cutover.
- Integrate greenhouse climate actuation and the Pollinator Drone Swarm telemetry into a unified operations view per Monitoring Systems specs.
- Maintain mesh reliability to the SLO (≥ 99.3% node availability; alert latency < 800 ms) and lead root-cause analysis on telemetry outages.
- Serve the on-call rotation (1 week in 4), responding to P1 mesh/CHLORA incidents within 15 minutes and restoring containment-critical telemetry first.
- Partner with Biosafety to ensure containment interlocks and breach-detection signals are independently verified and fail-safe.
- Document subsystem designs, runbooks, and change records; uphold change-control on all containment-relevant systems.
Required Qualifications
- Bachelor's in electrical, software, controls, mechatronics, or biosystems engineering; 5+ years in instrumentation, IoT/mesh, or industrial control.
- Strong embedded/distributed systems skills; time-series telemetry, sensor calibration, and control-loop tuning.
- Current CHLORA Operator and PhytoSense Operation certification (or ≤60d).
- Able to obtain GCL-3 clearance and pass GCL-2 medical fitness for in-bay sensor work.
Preferred Qualifications
- Experience with mesh networking, edge compute, or biomimetic data fabrics.
- Background in agritech, controlled-environment agriculture, or laboratory automation.
- Familiarity with safety-instrumented systems and fail-safe interlock design.
Certifications Required
| Certification | Status at Hire | Renewal |
|---|---|---|
| CHLORA Operator | Required (or ≤60d) | 24 months |
| PhytoSense Operation | Required (or ≤60d) | 24 months |
| Toxin Handling Tier 1 | Required ≤90d | Annual |
| Emergency Response — Basic | Required ≤90d | Annual |
Physical & Hazard Requirements
- Work at height and in confined spaces for sensor placement; lift up to 18 kg.
- Wear PPE appropriate to the bay grade during in-bay tasks.
- Tolerate humid, warm bay environments and on-call interruption.
Compensation Band
Career Path
Bio-Systems Engineer (E3) advances to Staff Engineer (E4) and Principal Engineer (E5), or into the Bio-Systems Engineering Lead management track. Adjacent moves include Greenhouse Climate Engineer (VC-HR-J045) and CHLORA Operations Analyst (VC-HR-J034).