Remote | Materials Engineer — Up to $80/hour

24-Mag•New York, NY

19h•$0 - $80•Remote

About The Position

We are sharing a specialised consulting opportunity for senior materials engineering professionals with doctoral-level expertise and substantial industry experience in materials selection, failure analysis, testing, or process development. This role supports an advanced AI research initiative focused on creating challenging, expert-level engineering problems grounded in realistic industry scenarios. Selected professionals will author original free-response materials engineering questions, develop complete technical solutions, and evaluate their difficulty against frontier AI models.

Requirements

PhD in Materials Science & Engineering, Metallurgy, or a materials-focused Mechanical or Chemical Engineering discipline is required
At least 5 years of hands-on professional or industry experience
Substantial expertise in materials selection, failure analysis, materials testing, or process development
Strong understanding of practical engineering workflows and industry constraints
Ability to formulate complex technical problems requiring multi-step reasoning
Excellent technical writing and analytical communication skills
Experience translating real engineering challenges into structured technical problems
Strong academic foundations combined with substantial practical industry experience are particularly important for this engagement

Nice To Haves

Experience within a major industrial, manufacturing, aerospace, automotive, energy, technology, or engineering organisation
Advanced expertise in materials characterisation or testing
Experience conducting root-cause or failure analysis
Background in process development or manufacturing engineering
Experience selecting materials for demanding performance or reliability requirements
Prior experience authoring technical assessments, engineering problems, or training materials
Familiarity with AI models or structured technical evaluation

Responsibilities

Author original, technically rigorous free-response problems in materials engineering
Develop questions based on realistic industrial and engineering scenarios
Design problems that require advanced reasoning rather than straightforward textbook recall
Incorporate practical constraints, engineering trade-offs, and professional judgment
Develop problems involving areas such as materials selection, failure analysis, testing, and process development
Apply advanced knowledge of materials science, metallurgy, and engineering behaviour
Incorporate relevant mechanical, chemical, thermal, structural, or manufacturing considerations
Ensure technical assumptions and problem conditions are realistic and internally consistent
Produce complete expert-level solutions for each authored problem
Clearly document calculations, reasoning, assumptions, and engineering methodology
Ensure solutions are technically rigorous and independently verifiable
Explain relevant materials behaviour and engineering decisions with appropriate depth
Evaluate each problem using multiple frontier language models
Assess whether current AI systems can correctly solve the problem
Refine questions where necessary to maintain an appropriately demanding level of difficulty
Document model errors, reasoning failures, or incomplete technical approaches
Validate that each problem meaningfully tests advanced materials engineering reasoning