Member of Technical Staff — Research, Physics at Causal Labs (San Francisco, CA)
Causal Labs· San Francisco, CA·
Role details
Job description
Our mission is general causal intelligence; AI that is capable of (1) predicting the future and (2) identifying the actions to alter it.
To achieve this breakthrough, we are building a Large Physics foundation Model (LPM) because physical systems, unlike text or images, are governed by verifiable cause and effect. We believe that scaling on physics will enable an understanding of causality required to predict and control physical systems, starting with weather.
Our founding team has built and deployed AI against the physical world in robotics, drug discovery, and particle physics at institutions like DeepMind, Waymo, Cruise, Insitro, Nabla Bio, and CERN.
We look for domain experts who are excited to tackle unsolved problems. Our thesis is that scaling on physics yields a model capable of understanding the causal structure to predict and alter the future. Your mission is to ensure the model evolves towards this thesis: grounded in physical law, evaluated against it, and ready to generalize across domains.
Responsibilities
- Bring physical principles to bear on the model — assessing consistency with conservation laws and physical constraints, and where physics-informed inductive biases help or hinder
- Develop evaluations that test whether the model's behavior is physically coherent, not just statistically accurate
- Advise on the physics of the systems we model, from fluid dynamics to thermodynamics, and their numerical treatment
- Investigate where the LPM generalizes across physical domains and where it breaks down
- Partner with model, evaluation, and interpretability teams to connect physical understanding to research direction
What we're looking for
We value a relentless approach to problem-solving, rapid execution, and the ability to quickly learn in unfamiliar domains.
- Deep expertise in physics — fluid dynamics, thermodynamics, computational physics, or a closely related field (typically a PhD or equivalent research experience)
- Familiarity with numerical simulation of physical systems (e.g. CFD) and its trade-offs
- Interest in where machine learning and physical modeling meet
- Ability to collaborate closely with ML researchers and translate physical principles into technical requirements
- A rigorous, evidence-driven approach to evaluating model quality
Why work at Causal Labs
- Mission‑driven challenge: Work on “civilizationally important” problems – general causal intelligence that could transform weather forecasting and climate adaptation.
- Research lab culture: Small, high‑autonomy team (7 people) with a flat structure; strong emphasis on experimentation and real‑world feedback loops.
- Safety emphasis: Join a team that prioritizes safety from day one, operating with principles used in autonomous vehicle deployment.
- Location & flexibility: Headquarters in San Francisco, California; hybrid/remote policy not explicitly stated but likely flexible for a small research lab.
- Perks: Opportunity to lead foundational model development from near‑zero stage; equity in a well‑funded seed‑stage startup backed by top‑tier investors.