Research Software Engineer – Scientific Data Encoding & Decoding

About the role

ECMWF is looking for a motivated Research Software Engineer to join the Foundational Software Services team. You will work on core libraries and tools that encode and decode meteorological, climate and geoscientific data, supporting both operational and research workflows.

Key responsibilities

• Develop, maintain and enhance ECMWF software libraries for handling GRIB, BUFR, NetCDF and other scientific formats.
• Lead development of the open‑source ecCodes package and contribute to related data‑handling tools such as earthkit.
• Support and optimise data‑processing workflows with a focus on correctness, performance and usability.
• Collaborate with scientists, analysts and developers from ECMWF and its Member States to translate requirements into robust technical solutions.
• Apply software‑engineering best practices, including CI/CD, testing and documentation.

Required profile

• Strong motivation for research‑oriented software development in the meteorological domain.
• Ability to work in a multidisciplinary team and communicate technical concepts effectively.
• Experience with open‑source development and collaborative coding environments.

Required skills

• Proficiency with WMO data formats: GRIB, BUFR.
• Experience using NetCDF for scientific data storage.
• Familiarity with the ecCodes library and earthkit framework.
• Knowledge of CI/CD pipelines and software‑engineering best practices.