Satellite Remote Sensing Fellowship

About the role

Rainmaker is seeking a full‑time, on‑site fellow to join its satellite remote‑sensing team in El Segundo, CA. The fellow will work on a scoped research project that supports the company’s cloud‑seeding and precipitation‑enhancement programs, collaborating closely with a mentor and other scientists.

Key responsibilities

• Acquire, process, collocate, and quality‑control microwave, polar‑orbiting, and geostationary satellite observations.
• Reproduce existing retrievals or operational baselines, then test and implement improvements using physical, statistical, or machine‑learning methods.
• Validate satellite products against radar, NWP, soundings, surface observations, and Rainmaker’s aircraft, UAS, or in‑situ measurements.
• Quantify detection skill, bias, uncertainty, spatial representativeness, latency, coverage, and failure modes across meteorological regimes.
• Build documented, reproducible workflows and present findings to scientists, operators, and technical leadership.

Required profile

• Current undergraduate, master’s, PhD student, post‑doctoral researcher, recent graduate, or other early‑career researcher.
• Strong quantitative ability and programming experience, preferably in Python.
• Interest in microwave sounders, polar‑orbiting or geostationary imagery, retrieval methods, or scientific data products.
• Comfort working with large, imperfect, multidimensional observational datasets.
• High agency, able to own a bounded workstream while collaborating with senior researchers.

Required skills

• Python programming

What we offer

• Paid fellowship at $8,000 per month with full health coverage (medical, dental, vision).
• Lunch provided on‑site, fully stocked kitchenette, and free EV charging.
• Stock options, 401(k) with employer match, unlimited PTO, paid holidays, parental leave, and relocation assistance for eligible candidates.
• Potential consideration for future full‑time roles and support for publication when appropriate.