{"id":182096,"url":"https://alion.io/job/dropzone-ai-ai-research-engineer","title":"AI Research Engineer","company":{"id":10085,"name":"Dropzone AI","domain":"dropzone.ai","url":"https://alion.io/company/dropzone","size_band":"51-200","is_staffing_agency":false,"employer_type":"direct","is_intermediary":false,"listed_via":null,"ats_vendor":"Greenhouse","truth_index":null},"role":"AI/ML","role_family":"AI/ML","seniority":"senior","employment_type":null,"work_mode":"hybrid","remote_scope":null,"remote_scope_basis":null,"remote_working_hours":null,"hiring_geo_confidence":"structured","locations":[],"countries":[],"hiring_countries":[],"hiring_countries_total":0,"salary":{"min":200000,"max":250000,"currency":"USD","period":"year","gross":null,"usd_annual":250000},"salary_estimate":null,"experience_years_min":5,"visa_sponsorship":false,"relocation_package":false,"has_equity":false,"technologies":[{"name":"AI Agents","optional":false},{"name":"AutoGen","optional":false},{"name":"Claude Code","optional":false},{"name":"Function Calling","optional":false},{"name":"Hallucination","optional":false},{"name":"Human-in-the-Loop","optional":false},{"name":"LangGraph","optional":false},{"name":"LLM Evaluation","optional":false},{"name":"LLM Guardrails","optional":false},{"name":"Python","optional":false},{"name":"RAG","optional":false},{"name":"Structured Outputs","optional":false},{"name":"Synthetic Data","optional":false},{"name":"Tool Use","optional":false},{"name":"LangChain","optional":true}],"status":"live","first_seen_at":"2026-08-31T19:54:37Z","employer_posted_date":"2026-10-07","last_verified_at":"2026-10-17T06:35:34Z","board_verified":true,"closed_at":null,"days_open":46,"trust":{"level":"ok","repost_count":null,"flags":[],"days_open":46},"description":"About Dropzone AI\nDropzone’s mission is to scale cybersecurity beyond human limits, and augment every single human security engineer/analyst with an army of AI security specialists. Humans alone cannot sufficiently protect our digital future, and AI augmentation is the only way for defenders to reclaim the high ground. We are an award winning company disrupting the $200B+ cybersecurity market. \nPowered by Gen AI advancements, our technology offloads repetitive day-to-day work and frees human analysts to focus on real threats and higher-value projects. We are venture-backed, and our team has a rare blend of deep experience across cybersecurity, AI/ML, and SaaS product development. Join us if you want to be on the ground floor of using Gen AI to transform cyber defense. Learn more at www.dropzone.ai.\nAbout the role\nWe are seeking a Senior to Principal-level AI Research Engineer to lead the design and development of next-generation agentic AI systems. This role sits at the intersection of research and production, with a strong emphasis on:\nAgent architecture design\nHarness and memory engineering\nRobust evaluation and benchmarking of model and agent performance\nYou will work closely with product and engineering teams to translate cutting-edge research into scalable, real-world systems. \nIn this role, you will directly shape the core intelligence layer of Dropzone AI. Your work will define how our agents reason, remember, and improve over time, influencing both our product capabilities and the broader direction of applied AI systems.\nWhat we're looking for\nSomeone who thinks in context/harness engineering, not just models\nA learner who can follow latest research and test them in real-world deployment\nDeep curiosity about how to convert non deterministic outputs from LLMs to consistent reliable outcomes and replicate expert human intuitions \nStrong ownership mindset and ability to drive ambiguous problems to clarity\nWhat you'll do\nAgentic Architecture\nDesign and implement advanced multi-step reasoning agents (tool use, planning, reflection, self-improvement loops)\nDevelop frameworks for multi-agent coordination and task decomposition\nImprove reliability, latency, and cost efficiency of agent execution\nMemory Systems\nArchitect short-term and long-term memory subsystems (episodic, semantic, retrieval-based, hybrid)\nBuild mechanisms for context compression, retrieval, and grounding\nExplore novel approaches to continual learning and state persistence\nEvaluation & Reliability\nDefine and implement evaluation frameworks for agent performance (task success, reasoning quality, robustness)\nBuild automated eval pipelines (synthetic data, adversarial testing, regression testing)\nEstablish metrics and benchmarks for agent reliability in production\nResearch → Production\nTranslate latest community research ideas into production-grade systems\nRun experiments, analyze results, and iterate quickly\nContribute to internal knowledge sharing and technical direction\nRequirements\n5+ years in software engineering, with at least 1+ year applying GenAI in production\nProven experience building or researching:\nAgent frameworks / tool-using LLMs\nMemory / retrieval systems (RAG, vector DBs, hybrid retrieval)\n\nExpert Python developer\nFamiliar with openclaw and Claude Code harness architecture\nEarly-stage startup mindset. You thrive on ambiguity and move with lightspeed execution\nPreferred\nExperience with agent orchestration frameworks (LangGraph, AutoGen, custom systems)\nFamiliarity with AI safety guardrails, hallucination mitigation, and structured output enforcement\nExperience designing LLM evals (offline + online, human-in-the-loop, synthetic data)\nPublications or open-source contributions in relevant areas\nExperience applying latest context/harness engineering techniques to customer facing products\nFounder or early-stage (first 10 engineers) or experience in standing up a new technology bet within a more established company\nWork Environment/Travel\nWe are a 100% remote company where you will work from your home with company-provided equipment to set you up for success. Semi-frequent travel to professional office settings and other events locally and nationally; some overnight travel expected.\nCompensation\nIn the spirit of pay transparency, we are excited to share the base salary range below, exclusive of fringe benefits or potential bonuses. If you are hired at Dropzone your final base salary compensation will be determined based on factors such as geographic location, skills, education, and/or experience. In addition to those factors, we believe in the importance of pay equity and consider internal equity of our current team members as a part of any final offer. Please keep in mind that hiring at the maximum of the range would not be typical to allow for future and continued salary growth. We also offer a generous benefits package, including company paid health insurance, 401K Plan with employer match, Self-Managed PTO, parental leave, and more.\nThe pay range for this role is:\n$200,000—$250,000 USD","description_format":"text","description_chars":5059,"description_truncated":false,"requirements":{"experience_years_min":5,"management_years_min":null,"team_size_min":null,"manages_managers":false,"education":null,"security_clearance":false,"languages":[]},"benefits":["401k plan","Equity","Health insurance","Parental leave"],"hiring_locations":[{"name":"United States","iso":"US","kind":"country"}],"hiring_excludes":[],"relocation_offered":false,"industries":["Information Security","Incident Response","Security Operations","Cybersecurity AI"],"lifecycle":[{"event":"open","at":"2026-09-01T00:56:07Z"}],"visa":[{"country":"US","licensed_sponsor":true,"evidence":"green card filings: 1","filings_12m":0,"filings_prev_12m":0,"green_card_filings_12m":1,"median_offered_wage_usd":137500,"route":null,"cap_exempt":false,"checked_at":"2026-10-15T11:24:14+00:00","sources":["US Department of Labor: PERM disclosure data (green cards)"],"filings_for_role_12m":0}],"liveness":{"score":74,"band":"hot","label":"Hiring now","p_open":1,"p_active":0.823,"p_room":0.9,"age_days":46,"expected_fill_days":68,"reasons":["conf:3","velocity","win:mid"],"computed_at":"2026-10-17T05:46:00Z"},"pay":{"stated_usd_annual":250000,"is_top_pay":true},"html_url":"https://alion.io/job/dropzone-ai-ai-research-engineer","json_url":"https://alion.io/job/dropzone-ai-ai-research-engineer.json","meta":{"generated_at":"2026-10-17T09:48:05Z","cache_seconds":300,"methodology":"https://alion.io/methodology","terms":"https://alion.io/terms","contact":"https://alion.io/contact","api":"https://alion.io/developers","about":"Alion is a live layer of people, companies and AI agents: who they are, whether they are real and active right now, what they do and how to work with them, readable by people and by agents and paid per call.","catalog":"https://alion.io/catalog.json","usage":{"tier":"crawler_verified","counted_by":"address","units_charged":1,"used_today":12909,"day_limit":null,"remaining_today":null,"minute_limit":300,"resets_at":"2026-10-18T00:00:00Z"}},"offers":[{"id":"company.slices","title":"One company in depth, by slice","status":"live","price":{"credits":0.02,"usd":0.002,"plus_per_slice":{"credits":0.05,"usd":0.005}},"unit":"per company, plus each slice with data","note":"the employer in depth","call":{"mcp_tool":"get_company","arguments":{"id":10085},"rest":"https://alion.io/mcp/rest/get_company?id=10085"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=company.slices&for=job%2Fdropzone-ai-ai-research-engineer"},{"id":"market.stats","title":"A market slice: pay, demand and time to fill","status":"live","price":{"credits":1,"usd":0.1},"unit":"per slice","note":"pay, demand and time to fill for this role and place","call":{"mcp_tool":"market_stats"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=market.stats&for=job%2Fdropzone-ai-ai-research-engineer"},{"id":"job.search","title":"Open jobs by role, technology, place, pay and visa","status":"live","price":{"credits":0.02,"usd":0.002},"unit":"per posting in a list","note":"similar open postings","call":{"mcp_tool":"search_jobs"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=job.search&for=job%2Fdropzone-ai-ai-research-engineer"},{"id":"company.verify","title":"Is this company real and active right now","status":"pilot","price":null,"unit":"per company","request":{"url":"https://alion.io/catalog/request","method":"POST","body":"{\"offer\": \"company.verify\", \"for\": \"job/dropzone-ai-ai-research-engineer\", \"note\": \"what you need it for\"}"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=company.verify&for=job%2Fdropzone-ai-ai-research-engineer"}]}