Senior Optical Engineer at Ciena in Ottawa, ON

Job description

As the global leader in high-speed connectivity, Ciena builds the critical infrastructure powering the AI era. We’re a technology company shaping the future of networking, guided by innovation, integrity, and collaboration. Through development opportunities, meaningful work, and flexibility, Ciena supports growth and well-being—on and off the job. Connect with a career that matters. As a senior technical contributor on the Optical Systems Performance (OSP) Team, the Optical Systems Engineer advances end-to-end optical fiber sensing architectures and system designs spanning coherent modems, optical line systems, telemetry, signal processing, analytics, and application interfaces. The role applies theoretical and experimental optical engineering expertise to current and next-generation platforms, helping translate customer and business needs into integrated sensing system designs. How you will make an impact: Own end-to-end optical fiber sensing architectures within the OSP team, translating customer and business needs into system requirements, architecture decisions, interface definitions, performance budgets, and technical roadmaps. Lead the design and integration of sensing solutions across coherent modems, optical line systems, embedded telemetry, timing and synchronization, data transport, signal processing, analytics, and application interfaces. Define sensing performance metrics and system specifications, develop link and noise budgets, identify key trade-offs, and validate designs through analytical modeling, numerical simulation, laboratory experiments, and field trials. Provide technical leadership from concept through implementation, verification, deployment, and lifecycle support, including design reviews, risk management, root-cause analysis, and resolution of complex cross-domain issues. Develop and apply optical engineering expertise in fiber propagation, coherent detection, optical amplification, optical switching, link engineering, impairments, and measurement science to ensure sensing functions coexist with communications performance. Plan and execute laboratory and field investigations of modem-based and line-system-based sensing, including experimental design, instrumentation, data acquisition, signal analysis, performance characterization, and interpretation of results. Collaborate with hardware, modem, software, systems, product line management, solutions engineering, services, and customer teams to drive architecture alignment, integration priorities, demonstrations, and deployment readiness. The must haves : Education: Graduate or post-graduate degree in Physics, Electrical Engineering, Engineering Physics, or a related discipline, with application of optical engineering to communications, sensing, or complex photonic systems. Experience: 5+ years of experience with optical fiber sensing principles, signal processing, data analysis, and performance characterization, with the ability to connect physical phenomena to system-level requirements and observed measurements. Demonstrated ownership of complex system designs through requirements definition, architecture, modeling, prototyping, verification, integration, optimization, and deployment. Application of theoretical knowledge of fiber-optic propagation, coherent optical systems, noise and impairments, optical amplification, optical switching, polarization effects, and digital communications. Application of experimental optical engineering skills, including laboratory setup design, optical alignment and handling, calibration, uncertainty analysis, and use of oscilloscopes, signal generators, optical power meters, spectrum analyzers, polarization-control equipment, and related test instrumentation in an ESD-protected environment. Utilization of MATLAB and Python for development of models, analysis workflows, and reusable engineering tools. Proven ability to debug ambiguous, multidisciplinary system issues, make technical decisions with incomplete informatio