Lead AI Engineer

MITRE; Springfield (VA); On-site; USD 174,000 - 261,000; Full time

Job summary

MITRE’s TSAI Department seeks highly motivated researchers to assess threats to AI systems and develop defenses against adversarial tactics. You will work with a team of intelligence analysts to research, analyze, and produce timely intelligence reports.

The role requires leading interdisciplinary teams, communicating complex technical ideas to diverse audiences, and maintaining an active Top Secret/SCI clearance. On-site work five days a week is required.

Qualifications

• Minimum 8 years AI experience with a Bachelor's degree in a relevant field; or 6 years and a Master’s; or a PhD with 3 years’ experience; or equivalent combination of AI education and work experience.
• Advanced understanding of foundational AI/ML theory, with demonstrated ability to reason about AI system behavior, vulnerabilities, and evaluation.
• Hands-on experience with building and evaluating computer vision systems.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills to articulate challenging technical concepts to both lay and expert audiences.
• Proven ability to lead interdisciplinary teams and engage senior mission stakeholders across technical and operational domains.
• Must have an active Top Secret/SCI clearance and must be eligible to obtain and maintain a Top Secret/SCI with CI Polygraph. U.S. citizenship required.
• This position has an on-site requirement of 5 days a week on-site.

Responsibilities

• Assess AI threats and research defenses against adversarial tactics.
• Produce intelligence reports in collaboration with analysts.
• Evaluate threats to AI-enabled systems and study adversary usage patterns.
• Convey complex ideas to non-technical audiences through intelligence products and briefings.

Skills

AI/ML theory

Computer vision

Technical writing

Leadership

Security clearance

Education

Bachelor's degree in a relevant field

Master's degree

PhD

Tools

MITRE ATLAS threat matrix

AI security tools

Job description

At MITRE, your passion fuels work that impacts our nation and improves lives. This is where your skills strengthen national security, cybersecurity, health, transportation, and citizen services. We’re a nonprofit engineering, applied research, and advanced technology organization working in the public interest. With objectivity and integrity at our core, we lead federally funded research and development centers for U.S. government agencies – collaborating with industry and academia to deliver integrated, high-impact solutions that advance our nation’s health, security, and prosperity. Our people tackle the toughest technical challenges, supported by competitive benefits, meaningful career development, and a culture of innovation, collaboration, and technical excellence. Choose MITRE for a career with purpose — and help shape the future.

Department Summary:

MITRE’s Trustworthy & Secure AI (TSAI) Department consists of a diverse team united by a passion and a sense of urgency to harness trustworthy and assured artificial intelligence (AI) to help solve problems in the public interest. The TSAI Department supports our sponsors' missions by delivering capabilities for securing and increasing trust in AI-enabled systems, including data driven AI risk awareness and mitigation, AI red teaming, and trusted tools and techniques for applying AI in high consequence environments. The TSAI Department works across government, industry, and academia to provide, assess, and shape trustworthy and secure AI systems to address complex mission needs for our sponsors. Our work provides opportunities to address real-world challenges in the rapidly developing field of AI assurance, and to research and prototype new methods to address mission needs. We are looking for highly motivated, adaptive, and self-directed candidates to perform research, development, engineering, evaluation, and integration of secure AI systems.

Roles & Responsibilities:

The position involves assessing threats to AI systems, research and development of defenses and mitigations against adversarial AI tactics and techniques. Specific responsibilities will include:

• Perform AI adversarial threat analysis to identify and characterize vulnerabilities in real-world national security systems
• Work as a technical subject matter expert within a team of intelligence analysts to research, analyze and produce intelligence reports
• Assessing threats to AI-enabled systems and use of AI by adversaries
• Convey complex ideas to non-technical audiences through intelligence production, briefings and/or white papers

Basic Qualifications:

• Typically requires a minimum of 8 years of experience in artificial intelligence with a Bachelor's degree in a relevant field; or 6 years and a Master’s degree; or a PhD with 3 years’ experience; or equivalent combination of AI-related education and work experience.
• Advanced understanding of foundational AI/ML theory, with demonstrated ability to reason about AI system behavior, vulnerabilities, and evaluation
• Hands-on experience with building and evaluating computer vision systems
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills to articulate challenging technical concepts to both lay and expert audiences
• Proven ability to lead interdisciplinary teams and engage senior mission stakeholders across technical and operational domains
• Must have an active Top Secret/SCI and must be eligible to obtain and maintain a Top Secret/SCI with CI Polygraph U.S Government issued Security Clearance. Per the U.S. Government’s eligibility requirements, you must be a U.S Citizen to be considered for a security clearance.
• This position has an on-site requirement of 5 days a week on-site

Preferred Qualifications:

• Advanced degree in computer science, engineering, or related disciplines
• Hands-on experience deploying and using enterprise-grade AI systems, particularly generative, agentic, and/or multimodal AI systems
• Experience with one or more of the following AI security topics: AI red teaming, AI T&E, adversarial AI, AI-enhanced cybersecurity, AI strategy and governance
• Experience generating or analyzing intelligence reporting data
• Familiarity with MITRE ATLAS threat matrix
• Experience leading small to medium sized teams to solve practical technical challenges
• Active IC or DOD TS/SCI security clearance with CI Poly

This requisition requires the candidate to have a minimum of the following clearance(s):

Top Secret/SCI

This requisition requires the hired candidate to have or obtain, within one year from the date of hire, the following clearance(s):

Top Secret/SCI/Polygraph

Salary compensation range and midpoint:

$174,000 - $217,500 - $261,000 Annual

Work Location Type:

Onsite

Commitment to Non-Discrimination

All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to disability, status as a protected veteran or any other status protected by applicable federal, state, local or international law.

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