AI Research Scientist - Fully Remote | Up to $200/hr

About the job

Mercor connects elite creative and technical talent with leading AI research labs. Headquartered in San Francisco, our investors include Benchmark, General Catalyst, Peter Thiel, Adam D'Angelo, Larry Summers, and Jack Dorsey.

Position: Machine Learning Expert
Type:Contract
Compensation:$150–$200/hour
Location:Remote

Role Responsibilities

• Develop challenging machine learning engineering tasks for a long-horizon AI research project.
• Design tasks that challenge frontier models, ensuring they are solved in no more than 2 out of 8 attempts.
• Focus on inference, evaluation, and systems work rather than heavy model training. Tasks run on both GPU and CPU.
• Clearly explain why each problem is difficult for a frontier model.
• Contribute ideas without needing to build or review the tasks yourself.

Qualifications

Must-Have

• Current or recent role as an ML research engineer, research scientist, or applied scientist.
• Experience with training, fine-tuning, or optimizing models in PyTorch or JAX.
• Deep knowledge in at least one area: LLMs, GPU inference and performance, Reinforcement learning (RL), or Scientific ML.
• Ability to explain why a problem is hard for a frontier model.

Preferred

• Experience writing benchmark or evaluation questions.
• PhD in ML, CS, or physics, or an MSc with strong research output.
• Publications.
• Prior Mercor contracts with strong performance.

Application Process (Takes 20–30 mins to complete)

• Upload resume
• AI interview based on your resume
• Submit form

Resources & Support

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PS: Our team reviews applications daily. Please complete your AI interview and application steps to be considered for this opportunity.