Physics Researcher for AI Model Evaluation

Contribute domain expertise at the frontier of physics to help develop and evaluate next-generation AI systems for scientific reasoning. You will apply active research judgment across theoretical and experimental subfields, create and validate challenging evaluation material, and identify the concrete failure modes that distinguish a working researcher from a textbook-level solver. This role is remote and will place contributors within a leading AI lab as part of its extended workforce, employed by Cincinnatus LLC.

• Review and evaluate physics research papers for correctness, novelty, and significance.
• Author and review difficult, research-level physics problems used to train and evaluate advanced AI models.
• Evaluate model outputs on tasks including analytical derivation, mechanism prediction, numerical modeling, experimental design, and literature reasoning.
• Identify and document where current models fail, with emphasis on mistakes a working PhD physicist would catch immediately.
• Collaborate closely with a small program team and other senior contributors on evaluation design and feedback.

• Publication record with first-author or co-first-author papers in top journals, for example Physical Review Letters, Physical Review X, Reviews of Modern Physics, Nature Physics, Nature, Science, PNAS, Nature Communications, the Physical Review A/B/C/D/E family, Physics Letters B, Journal of High Energy Physics, Astrophysical Journal, Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, Quantum, or Communications Physics.
• Doctoral or postdoctoral training from a top-20 global institution in physics or a related STEM field, or equivalent research experience.
• Competitive fellowships or awards are a plus, such as NSF Graduate Research Fellowship, Hertz Fellowship, DOE Computational Science Graduate Fellowship, DOE Early Career award, Sloan Research Fellowship, Packard Fellowship, Simons Investigatorship or Junior Fellowship, Hubble, Einstein, Sagan, or Kavli Fellowship, Marie Curie/MSCA award, Fulbright, Rhodes, Marshall, Gates Cambridge, Schmidt Science Fellowship, NSF CAREER award, or APS Fellowship.
• Experience as a named Principal Investigator or Co-Investigator on grants, issued patents, or a spin-out company is valued.
• An International Physics Olympiad medal is relevant experience.
• Current or recent active research role matters, for example PhD candidate, postdoctoral researcher, instructor, faculty member, principal scientist, or industry researcher. Active faculty, postdoctoral researchers, and PhD candidates will be prioritized over general staff research-scientist titles.
• Outstanding senior PhD students and recent graduates with strong publication records are strongly encouraged to apply; depth of research output matters more than years of experience.

• Engagement is part-time, up to 20 hours per week.
• Remote work, with placement inside a leading AI lab as part of its extended workforce.
• Employment is provided by Cincinnatus LLC, which serves as employer of record and handles W-2 employment, payroll, and compliance while placing employees directly within client teams.
• Placement is a selective cohort process and depends on available projects at partner labs building models for scientific reasoning.

• Hourly rate range: $80 to $110 per hour.
• Final compensation will reflect research seniority and credentials.

• Cincinnatus LLC is an Equal Employment Opportunity employer. Applicants will not be discriminated against on the basis of any legally protected characteristic.
• The company is committed to providing reasonable accommodations for qualified individuals with disabilities and disabled veterans throughout the application process.
• Opportunities may be discovered through third-party listing platforms; employment, onboarding, payroll, and benefits for these roles are administered by Cincinnatus LLC.

Submit your application through the platform where this opportunity is listed. Candidates are expected to have an active research record in physics at the working researcher level. Cincinnatus LLC will manage employment, onboarding, payroll, and related administrative processes for selected contributors. Note that selection is competitive and cohort placement depends on project availability at partner labs.