Forensic Materials Expert - Fully Remote | Upto $75/task Task based

mercor; United States; Remote; USD 90,000 - 103,000; Full time

Job summary

Mercor connects elite creative and technical talent with leading AI research labs. The contractor role is remote, hourly, and focused on creating and evaluating prompts related to energetic materials and propulsion, with a strong emphasis on safety and policy compliance.

As a Federal Certified Materials Specialist / Incident Analyst, you will work asynchronously to develop reference answers, analyze dual-use scenarios, and improve AI model performance for high-stakes domains.

Qualifications

• Federally certified explosives specialist or national equivalent.
• Experience in forensic laboratory identification of energetic materials.
• Expertise in post-incident analysis and reporting for an agency or laboratory.
• Regulatory inspection experience of licensees and permittees.
• Strong technical writing or published research experience.

Responsibilities

• Write challenging single-turn prompts in the domain of energetic materials and propulsion.
• Label them as benign, dual-use, or adversarial.
• Evaluate model responses against a defined policy standard.
• Write reference answers, providing correct responses and technical reasoning.
• Analyze dual-use scenarios where residue analysis and diversion indicators are critical.
• Ensure models refuse dangerous questions while answering legitimate ones accurately.

Skills

Explosives expertise

Forensic laboratory experience

Post-incident analysis

Regulatory inspection experience

Technical writing

Job description

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

Federal Certified Materials Specialist / Incident Analyst

Type: Contract

Compensation: $65–$75/hour

Location: Remote

Role Responsibilities

• Write challenging single-turn prompts in the domain of energetic materials and propulsion. Label them as benign, dual-use, or adversarial.
• Evaluate model responses against a defined policy standard. Judge whether each response was handled correctly.
• Write reference answers, providing correct responses and technical reasoning.
• Analyze dual-use scenarios where residue analysis and diversion indicators are critical.
• Ensure models refuse dangerous questions while answering legitimate ones accurately.
• Work independently and asynchronously to meet deadlines and improve AI model performance.

Qualifications Must-Have

• Federally certified explosives specialist or national equivalent.
• Experience in forensic laboratory identification of energetic materials.
• Expertise in post-incident analysis and reporting for an agency or laboratory.
• Regulatory inspection experience of licensees and permittees.
• Strong technical writing or published research experience.

Compensation & Legal

• Hourly contractor
• Paid weekly via Stripe Connect