Nonproliferation Analyst

About the work

Mercor is assembling a panel of nuclear materials and safeguards experts to red-team frontier AI models. The goal is to test whether a model can correctly judge the misuse potential of a technical request — answering legitimate questions fully while refusing genuinely dangerous ones.

You will:

• Write challenging single-turn prompts in your domain, labelled across three levels: benign, dual-use, and adversarial.
• Evaluate the responses that come back against a defined policy standard, and judge whether each was handled correctly.
• Write the reference answer — what a correct response looks like, and the technical reasoning for why.

This domain lives on the dual-use line more than most. The same control list that stops a shipment tells a procurement agent what to avoid declaring; the same pathway analysis that informs policy is a roadmap read from the other direction. A model that refuses a routine export-classification question is failing as badly as one that answers a question it shouldn't. Drawing that line reliably is why we need practitioners rather than generalists.

Background we're looking for

We're looking for people who have worked proliferation questions professionally — export control, treaty implementation, or programme analysis — and who can tell a compliance question from a circumvention question. What matters most is being able to tell a routine professional question from one that's fishing for something else: the same control list that blocks a transfer also names what to route around. You will be writing prompts that sit exactly on that line, then judging whether the model held it.

Examples of relevant backgrounds (ideally with red-teaming experience):

• Export control licensing, classification or enforcement — dual-use lists, catch-all controls, end-user screening
• Treaty and agreement implementation — NPT, CTBT, safeguards agreements, bilateral cooperation agreements
• Proliferation pathway and programme analysis at a laboratory, agency, ministry or research institute
• Sanctions, procurement network or illicit trade analysis
• Open-source and technical analysis of nuclear programmes

What this role demands beyond technical depth

This is writing-intensive work. Every judgment you make needs a written rationale that a non-specialist can follow. Prior technical writing, published research, or expert witness experience is a strong signal; please include a sample or link. You will also be reading and writing about misuse scenarios in your field for sustained periods. We brief experts on this in advance, and you can pause or step away at any point without penalty.

Before you apply

Your work here will not involve, and must not draw on, classified or export-controlled information, or anything covered by an NDA or prepublication review obligation. If you hold such obligations you may still be a good fit; tell us in your application and we will scope the work accordingly.