Current sophomore, junior, and senior undergraduates are invited to apply for research internship positions at Berkeley SETI Research Center. BSRC is a world-leader in the search for extraterrestrial intelligence – the quest for a scientific answer to one of humanity’s oldest questions: Are we alone in the Universe? Housed in the Astronomy Department at the University of California, Berkeley, the team at BSRC leads the science program for the $100-million Breakthrough Listen project. Our scientists and engineers are pioneers in the development of software, instrumentation, and science strategy for the search for intelligent life on other worlds. We have access to substantial amounts of time on the planet’s largest telescopes, connections to leading players in industry, and we’re based in one of the world’s premiere astronomy research institutions. We’re also psyched that we get to wake up each day and hunt for aliens.

In December 2020, we will open appliations for undergraduate research interns for summer 2021, to work at the cutting edge of the search. Previous interns have written machine learning algorithms to look for anomalous signals, searched data from the TESS spacecraft for transiting megastructures, used observations from the Green Bank Telescope to study fast radio bursts, and much more. If you are motivated, work well as a member of a team, and can take initiative and responsibility for your own work, you’ll fit in well in our group. In fact, our Director Dr. Andrew Siemion started his own research career as a UC Berkeley undergraduate!

The majority of our projects make heavy use of modern programming languages and tools. While we don’t expect applicants to be experts in all of these areas, familiarity and experience with one or more of Python / Jupyter, version control (e.g. git / github), database software (e.g. MySQL), visualization tools (e.g. Bokeh, D3, etc.), GPU programming, visualization, interface design, machine-learning, cloud computing, Unix / Linux scripting, and / or public outreach will make for a strong application. Prior astronomy research experience is not a prerequisite, although if you have knowledge or experience of positional astronomy, observational astronomy, radio astronomy, signal processing, and / or data reduction we would like to hear about that in your application. We'll also train you to operate some of the planet's largest radio telescopes (Green Bank and Parkes) - again, no prior experience is required, but we would like to hear about it if you have any.

You will be required to be resident within commute distance of the UC Berkeley campus for the duration of the program. By applying, you commit to being available for 40 hours of work per week (June 7 – August 13, 2021). You’ll be expected to work closely with other interns, to consult with our researchers as necessary, and to attend twice-weekly meetings. You’ll be expected to keep notes on your progress, to check your code in frequently to github, and to keep in touch with us on our Slack account. A stipend of $8364 is provided, which is intended to cover all of your expenses during the program including travel, meals, and accommodation. The program is open to students currently enrolled at degree-granting institutions in the United States (including non-citizens legally present in the US for study purposes). Women, underrepresented minorities, transfer students, and others traditionally underrepresented in science are strongly encouraged to apply.

Further information about the application procedure will be posted here in December 2020.