DevOps Engineer for HEP GPU Benchmarks (IT-CE-LCGGRAP)

The Worldwide LHC Computing Grid (WLCG) project is a global collaboration of around 170 computing centres in more than 40 countries linking up national and international grid infrastructures. As computing evolves for the High-Luminosity LHC (HL-LHC) era WLCG faces a rapidly growing computing demand alongside increasingly heterogeneous hardware environments (CPUs GPUs Cloud and HPC).

To guide procurement resource pledging performance studies and accounting the High Energy Physics (HEP) community relies on domain-specific benchmarking tools to accurately measure and compare computing resources.

As a Graduate / Applied Engineer (QUEST) you will join our team in CERNs IT Department to support the development operation and user support for WLCG HEPScore benchmarking services. You will contribute to key activities helping to build and maintain the next-generation benchmarking software stack for the WLCG community.

Your responsibilities

• Software Development: Actively contribute to the development packaging and distribution of the HEP benchmark software stack. Integrate profile and validate production-level GPU application workloads from LHC experiment software (e.g. event generation simulation fast inference and HLT).
• Containerisation: Build test and maintain container images of HEP workloads using automated GitLab CI/CD pipelines.
• Service Maintenance & Enhancement: Ensure the smooth operation of the core benchmarking infrastructure and data ingestion services using Puppet GitLab CI/CD ActiveMQ Logstash OpenSearch Kibana Apache Spark and Grafana.
• Performance Analysis: Collect process and analyze grid-wide benchmark data to evaluate performance scaling across diverse CPU/GPU architectures and server configurations.
• Technical Support: Provide technical support and documentation to the WLCG user community.

Your profile

• Advanced Python Development: Solid experience in Python programmingincluding modular code structurepackaging distribution and testing.
• Containerisation: Solid understanding of Docker and Apptainer/Singularity along with familiarity with GPU container execution runtime environments.
• DevOps & Infrastructure Automation: Proficiency with GitLab CI/CD pipelines container registries configuration management (Puppet) and deployment methodologies.
• Linux Systems & Performance Profiling: Strong Linux administration and shell scripting skills. Experience in system metrics tracking (e.g. CPU/GPU utilisation hardware performance metrics power monitoring).
• Data Analytics Pipelines & Visualisation: Experience with monitoring and data analytics stacks such as OpenSearch/Elasticsearch Logstash Kibana Grafana or Apache Spark.
• Communication & Collaboration: Good technical writing and communication skills to interact with domain experts across the global WLCG collaboration.

Skills

• Programming & Scripting: Python (code packaging testing) Bash Git.
• Containerisation: Docker Apptainer/Singularity.
• GPU Computing: NVIDIA Container Toolkit CUDA nvidia-smi AMD ROCm rocm-smi GPU profiling.
• DevOps: GitLab CI/CD Puppet Linux administration.
• Monitoring & Data Analytics: OpenSearch/Elasticsearch Logstash Kibana Grafana Apache Spark ActiveMQ.
• Spoken and written English with a commitment to learn French.

Eligibility criteria:

• You are a national of a CERN Member or Associate Member State.
• You have a professional background in Applied Physics Software Engineering (or a related field) and have either:
  • a Masters degree with 2 to 6 years of post-graduation professional experience;
  • or a PhD with no more than 3 years of post-graduation professional experience.
• You have never had a CERN fellow or graduate contract before.

Additional Information :

Job closing date: 17.11.2026 at 23:59 CET.

Contract duration: 24 months with a possible extension up to 36 months maximum.

Working hours: 40 hours per week

Job flexibility: Fully Onsite

Target start date: 01-January-2027

This position involves:

• Stand-by duty when required by the needs of the Organization.
• Work during nights Sundays and official holidays when required by the needs of the Organization.

Job reference: IT-CE-LCGGRAP

Field of work: Information Technologies

Benchmark job: 200020 - Computing Engineer

Global Benefits

• A monthly net stipend of either 6372 or 7004 Swiss Francs per month depending on your degree.
• 30 days of paid leave per year plus 2 weeks annual closure.
• Coverage by CERNs comprehensive health insurance scheme (for yourself your spouse and children) and membership of the CERN Pension Fund.
• Family child and infant monthly allowances depending on your individual circumstances.
• A relocation package (installation grant and travel expenses) depending on your individual circumstances.
• Possibility to extend your contract up to 36 months.
• On-the-job and formal training including language classes.

Overview of CERN - Discover a world where the impossible is made possible!

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Every day we face exciting new challenges and opportunities to contribute to cutting-edge research that shapes our understanding of the universe. We meet these challenges through the diverse perspectives within our teams ensuring every contribution is valued and driving our shared sense of inclusion and purpose. Diversity is a core value of CERN since its foundation and it remains central to our mission and continued success.

If you are ready to be part of a dynamic inclusive community pushing the boundaries of knowledge CERN is the place where your curiosity and skills can thrive. Be part of our mission to uncover what lies at the heart of the universe! TAKE PART!

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Remote Work :

No

Employment Type :

Full-time