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Salary: USD 140,000 - 220,000 / annual
General Matter is a venture-backed nuclear fuel enrichment company incubated within Founders Fund, backed by over a dozen top-tier VC firms. The company is designing, building, and operating low-cost uranium enrichment services in the US to support advanced reactors, AI infrastructure, and critical manufacturing. The mission is to make nuclear energy the cleanest, safest, and most affordable baseload power source.
As a Mechanical Engineer specializing in optomechanical systems, you will design, build, test, and own the mechanical structures and mechanisms that enable General Matter's next-generation enrichment technology. This includes precision optical and photonic subsystems, beam delivery hardware, and components engineered to withstand demanding thermal, chemical, and material-compatibility conditions unique to uranium processing.
Key responsibilities include:
- Develop and own precision mounts, alignment stages, beam delivery paths, and enclosures for optical/photonic subsystems through the complete product lifecycle (requirements, design, development, qualification, production release)
- Select and specify materials and coatings based on mechanical, thermal, optical, and corrosion/wear performance requirements
- Optimize designs for cost, performance, and manufacturability
- Conduct functional testing including thermal, vibration, shock, durability, and precision alignment/beam-pointing tests for optical assemblies
- Perform root-cause analysis on test failures and develop hardware mitigations
- Collaborate with materials scientists and metallurgists to characterize material behavior under process-relevant conditions, including exposure to high-energy optical sources
- Participate in design reviews and provide cross-functional feedback
- Work closely with electrical, optical, software, manufacturing, and nuclear engineers to ensure effective system integration
You will work in a fast-paced, mission-driven environment with a culture of urgency, accountability, and transparency. The team applies first-principles engineering to solve complex problems at the frontier of enrichment technology.
Requirements and Preferred Experience:
- Background or working knowledge in materials science or metallurgy, particularly failure analysis, material selection, or performance of metals/alloys under extreme thermal, mechanical, or corrosive conditions
- Experience designing precision mechanical structures for optical or photonic systems (alignment stages, athermal mounts, beam delivery paths, thermal management for high-energy optical components)
- Strong understanding of engineering fundamentals
- Ability to perform trade studies and make clear recommendations using first principles, even with partial information
- Experience in fast-paced engineering environments or highly technical roles requiring resourceful, entrepreneurial approaches to meet tight timeframes or budget constraints
- Ability to work extended hours and weekends as necessary
