Lead Scientist

Roadrunner Venture Studio • Albuquerque, NM

7d • $90,000 - $120,000

About The Position

Halo Materials is seeking a Lead Scientist to work closely with the CTO to advance our technical priorities. This is a high-impact role ideal for someone who enjoys defining and executing upon a research plan, moves fluidly between modeling “what should be tested” and getting their hands dirty in the lab, and relishes the challenge of building an R&D-heavy company from the ground up.
You’ll own the experimental roadmap of Halo Materials as we progress from lab-scale testing to commercial-scale reactor design and systems integration. This will entail designing and leading experiments, setting up and troubleshooting equipment, managing lab technicians, and data analysis to feed into future experiments.
This is a hands-on technical leadership position for someone who thrives in deep tech environments and can move seamlessly between lab bench execution, team leadership, and high-level technical strategy.

Requirements

• Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering, Materials Engineering, or closely related field
• 8+ years of experience in rigorous research and development environments such as university labs, deep tech startups, or corporate research teams.
• Proven ability to lead complex, multi-stakeholder projects—ideally involving lab environments, infrastructure, tech transfer, or industrial process scale-up.
• Strong organizational, strategic, and analytical skills; comfortable toggling between tactical execution and high-level planning.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills across technical and non-technical audiences.
• Demonstrated success working closely with C-level leaders and managing competing priorities.
• Technical literacy in engineering, materials science, or chemical processes.

Nice To Haves

• Experience in adjacent industries where similar high-temperature, catalytic, carbon, or materials growth processes are used — such as petrochemicals, advanced ceramics, specialty chemicals, battery materials, semiconductors, metallurgy, or industrial gas processing.
• Experience with government grants, compliance reporting, or lab buildouts.

Responsibilities

• Lead installation, calibration, commissioning, and troubleshooting of core lab equipment to rapidly expand experimental capacity.
• Design and execute rigorous design-of-experiments (DOE) programs to optimize graphite growth parameters such as temperature, feedstock composition, residence time, and process conditions.
• Identify performance drivers, bottlenecks, and failure modes to continuously improve yield, purity, energy efficiency, and scalability.
• Build scalable systems for experimental data collection, storage, and analysis to ensure high-quality, decision-ready insights.
• Translate lab results into techno-economic inputs (e.g. cost per kg, energy intensity, throughput) to inform commercialization strategy.
• Develop and document SOPs for safe, repeatable, and scalable lab operations.
• Co-manage and mentor lab technicians to expand experimental capacity and execution speed.
• Train and develop junior technical hires, building a culture of rigor, ownership, and continuous improvement.
• Collaborate with external research partners to investigate underlying graphite growth mechanisms and unlock performance improvements.
• Work closely with peer R&D scientists and executive leadership to align technical milestones with company strategy and commercial objectives.

Benefits

• An independent role with a supportive and flexible work environment
• Time for self-development, research, training, conferences, or certification schemes
• Full range of competitive benefits including a health care stipend and equity in a fast-growing startup

What This Job Offers

• Job Type: Full-time
• Career Level: Mid Level
• Education Level: Ph.D. or professional degree