Research Engineer - Agency and Reasoning

About this role

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
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• 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
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• 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