Research Software Engineer (f/m/d) with HPC Focus

About Us

The Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology (MPI‑GEA) was founded in the summer of 2022; it is a dynamically growing, highly interdisciplinary, and international research institution. The research focuses on modeling and analyzing the interrelationships between biophysical and human‑made systems, looking from the deep past to the future to examine how humanity has driven the emergence of the Anthropocene – the period in which human activities began significantly impacting our planet’s climate and ecosystems – and identifying potential intervention points towards a more sustainable future.

The Core Unit High Performance Computing (HPC) at the MPI‑GEA is the central support unit and technical partner for researchers. We help scientists translate scientific questions into efficient, reproducible HPC workflows by providing HPC environments, user support, training, documentation, and in‑house software development. We work closely with researchers and provide support grounded in real scientific needs.

Our institute seeks a Research Software Engineer with HPC Focus (f/m/d) for a fixed‑term position of initially 24 months, with the option of an unlimited contract thereafter.

Required

A scientific degree in computer science, computational science, engineering, physics, mathematics, or multiple years of comparable experience as a programmer or research software engineer with a focus on technologies relevant to high‑performance computing.

Experience with at least one compiled, performance‑oriented language (e.g., C, C++, Rust, Fortran) and at least one high‑level scripting language (e.g., Python, R). Basic familiarity with HPC environments and their internal workings (storage, networking, resource management and workload management systems).

Candidates should be able to demonstrate a strong proficiency in Linux and in working with the Linux command line and should be familiar with common tools for tracing, benchmarking, and profiling on *nix platforms.

Since the HPC Core Unit is a central support unit for researchers, enabling them to translate scientific questions into efficient and reproducible HPC workflows, candidates should have strong communication skills in English (B2) and be able to translate scientific needs into robust software and workflows.

Desired

Experiences with CUDA, OpenMP/MPI, scientific libraries (PETSc, GSL, OpenBLAS), LLM/Deep learning pipelines and corresponding software libraries (e.g., TensorFlow, PyTorch). Familiarity with basic software engineering fundamentals, including version control with Git, code review and testing, build systems, and continuous integration. Basic familiarity with containerization, particularly for HPC environments (Apptainer/Singularity).

Tasks

• Develop, maintain, and extend software for geoanthropological research with a focus on high-performance computing
• Port, optimise, and benchmark projects on HPC systems
• Help researchers translate scientific questions into efficient HPC workflows, consult on best practices, software libraries, and processes
• Support researchers in using HPC systems, e.g., with job scripts, debugging, and performance analysis
• Implement sustainable and reproducible and FAIR research software engineering practices
• Collaborate with other HPC facilities and project partners
• Help evaluate and integrate GPU acceleration and other modern HPC technologies

Our Offer

• Opportunity to contribute to foundational research in the new field of Geoanthropology
• Work with leading scientists in human‑Earth system science
• Access to state-of-the-art research infrastructure