Research Engineer - Agency and Reasoning

ZYPHRA IS AN ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE COMPANY BASED IN SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA. THE ROLE: As a Research Engineer - Agency and Reasoning, you will be a core contributor to Zyphra’s Agency and Reasoning Team. You will be involved with performing novel research in reinforcement learning, post-training, and human preference learning, and applying your ideas at scale to our next generation of language models. WHAT WE’RE LOOKING FOR / REQUIREMENTS: - Strong research taste and intuition - The ability to work through a research project from conception to execution to write-up - Strong implementation and prototyping skillset - A researcher who can take an idea from conception to experimentation extremely quickly - The ability to work well and cooperate with others in a high-paced research setting - Curiosity, interest, and joy in understanding intelligence. QUALIFICATIONS / ADDITIONAL SKILLS: - Experience and aptitude with reinforcement learning, either in the context of language model reasoning or more classical RL tasks - Experience with language-model-supervised fine-tuning and preference-learning methods, such as DPO and simPO. - Experience with context-length extension methods - A good intuitive ability to understand model behaviors and correct them through iterative fine-tuning - Interest in grappling in detail with data and spending significant time involved in data engineering and synthetic data generation - Postgraduate degree in a scientific subject (Computer Science, EE/EECS, Mathematics, Physics) - Previously published machine learning research in well-respected venues - Highly proficient with PyTorch and Python - We are excited and able to rapidly learn new fields and implement new ideas - Excellent communication and collaboration skills, and can work effectively on both research and engineering implementation at scale WHY WORK AT ZYPHRA: - Our research methodology is to make grounded, methodical steps toward ambitious goals. Both deep research and engineering excellence are equally valued - We strongly value new and crazy ideas and are very willing to bet big on new ideas - We move as quickly as we can; we aim to minimize the bar to impact as low as possible - We all enjoy what we do and love discussing AI BENEFITS AND PERKS: - Comprehensive medical, dental, vision, and FSA plans - Competitive compensation and 401(k) plan - Relocation and immigration support on a case-by-case basis - In-office snacks and meals provided - Unlimited PTO and company holidays - In-person team in San Francisco with a collaborative, high-energy environment