Frontier Physics Researcher: Golden Reference Solutions

Mercor; Greater London; On-site; GBP 81,000 - 137,000; Full time

Job summary

Mercor is seeking expert physics researchers to author and verify golden reference solutions for frontier physics benchmarks. You'll solve problems end-to-end with verifiable derivations, code, and references, auditing peers and adjudicating between attempts to produce human-verified reference data for evaluating models.

Responsibilities include decomposing tasks, writing Python templates with auto-grading, and documenting reasoning, tolerances, and tests.

Qualifications

• PhD or postdoc in the relevant subfield (senior PhD minimum).
• Auditor: postdoc or junior professor in the relevant subfield (PhD minimum).
• Adjudicator: full professor or industry PI in the relevant subfield (senior postdoc or junior professor).
• Hands-on familiarity with at least two canonical methods of the target subfield, demonstrable via publications.
• Proficient in LaTeX, Python, Jupyter and SymPy; strong written English.

Responsibilities

• Solve research-level physics challenges end-to-end with verifiable derivations, code, and peer-reviewed references
• Decompose challenges into standalone checkpoint sub-problems that require genuine physical reasoning
• Author Python answer templates with auto-grading functions for symbolic or numerical answers
• Audit submitted solutions for correctness, scope, and method soundness; deliver actionable feedback across iterations
• Adjudicate between parallel solver attempts and decide which solution becomes the golden reference
• Document chain-of-thought reasoning, error tolerances, equivalent symbolic forms, and verification test cases

Skills

LaTeX

Python

Jupyter

SymPy

English writing

Education

PhD or postdoc in relevant subfield

Tools

Jupyter Notebook

SymPy

Job description

Mercor is seeking expert physics researchers to author and verify golden reference solutions for frontier physics benchmarks. You'll solve problems end-to-end with verifiable derivations, code, and references, auditing peers and adjudicating between attempts to produce human-verified reference data for evaluating models.

Responsibilities include decomposing tasks, writing Python templates with auto-grading, and documenting reasoning, tolerances, and tests.