Nissan North America Inc. is hiring in Michigan, and the Japanese automaker is looking to create 9,000 jobs in the U.S., Mexico and Brazil over the next three years as part of a $5.2 billion investment.

Nissan North America has 50 openings at its Farmington Hills facility, Carla Bailo, senior vice president of research and development for Nissan in the Americas, said Thursday at the Center for Automotive Research Management Briefing Seminars here. The automaker needs engineers in a variety of areas, she said.

“The way that the engineer’s role has transformed over the years, we’re not just looking for mechanical or electrical engineers, but we need biomedical engineers to help us understand what happens to the body better in safety areas,” she said. “We also need more chemical engineers to help us with the chemistry of our advanced technologies.”

Nissan plans to add 150 jobs in the U.S. this year to support vehicle engineering and research and development, Bailo said

The automaker, which gained a record 8.2 percent of the U.S. market share last year, is looking to achieve 8 percent global market share by 2016, up from 6.2 percent in 2011.

By building the Nissan Rogue and Infiniti JX in the U.S., Nissan by 2015 will build 85 percent of the vehicles it sells in the American market in the United States, up from 69 percent.

Some of Nissan’s growth is occurring in Tennessee, where it’s adding hundreds of jobs and investing up to $1.7 billion to begin producing the Nissan Leaf electric vehicle and lithium-ion batteries at its Smyrna, Tenn., plant.

It’s also adding up to 90 new jobs as it begins production in late 2012 of electric motors for the Leaf at its site in Decherd, Tenn.

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