Python Jobs in Irvine, CA

1\. Role Overview

Mercor is seeking experienced researchers and technical experts to contribute to a project supporting a frontier-model evaluation effort focused on agentic workflows . You’ll design and validate challenging benchmark tasks in data science, machine learning, finance, and coding to help surface and diagnose reasoning and problem-solving gaps in a target STEM model. The work centers on building robust, real-world tasks with executable tests and then analyzing model / agent behavior. ## 2\. Key Responsibilities - Design challenging, real-world STEM problems - Implement each task inside an agentic development environment using Python ## 3\. Core Qualifications - Deep expertise in data science, machine learning, finance, and / or Python-based coding - Active or recently graduated PhD (Top U.S.-based school) - Strong research background in frontier STEM topics - Ability to engage reliably for 30+ hours / week , primarily on weekdays - Demonstrated technical output such as high-quality open-source contributions (especially in agentic / LLM tooling ecosystems) - Comfort reading and reasoning about agent behavior traces to diagnose failure modes beyond surface-level errors ## 4\. More About the Opportunity - Initial focus area : agentic workflows for STEM tasks - Familiarity with agentic frameworks and OSS ecosystems is helpful (examples include LangChain, MetaGPT, AutoGen, AutoGPT, CrewAI, LlamaIndex, BabyAGI, SuperAGI, CAMEL, AgentGPT, Dify, etc.) - Deliverables are expected to be reproducible and testable (clear specs, deterministic tests where possible, documented environments) ## 5\. About Mercor - Mercor is a talent marketplace that connects top experts with leading AI labs and research organizations. - Our investors include Benchmark, General Catalyst, Adam D’Angelo, Larry Summers, and Jack Dorsey. - Thousands of professionals across domains like law, creatives, engineering, and research have joined Mercor to work on frontier projects shaping the next era of AI.