Forensic Scientist — Nuclear Materials

AI safety evaluation

Contribute practical nuclear forensics expertise to an AI safety testing panel. The aim is to assess whether models answer legitimate technical questions accurately while recognizing and declining requests that could enable harm.

The work requires professional judgment about context and intent. Both unjustified refusals of routine professional questions and responses that provide inappropriate assistance count as failures.

Responsibilities

• Write challenging single-turn prompts labeled as benign, dual-use or adversarial.

• Evaluate model responses against the defined policy standard and record whether each was handled correctly.

• Write a reference answer showing the appropriate response and the technical rationale supporting it.

Relevant professional background

The role calls for people who have characterised real nuclear material — detection, attribution, and the analytical work behind a defensible conclusion. Professional judgment must distinguish legitimate requests from potential misuse: the same signature that identifies a source tells you what to hide.

Create prompts that test that distinction and assess whether the response respects it. Relevant backgrounds include the following; prior AI safety testing is helpful:

• Nuclear forensics casework or international exercise participation — sample characterisation and attribution

• Radiochemical and mass-spectrometric analysis — isotopics, age dating, impurity and process signatures

• Detection and interdiction technology — portal monitors, handheld identification, search operations

• Material signature libraries, reference materials and attribution methodology

• Pre- or post-detonation forensics research at a national laboratory or agency

Writing and working conditions

Every evaluation needs a clear written rationale that a non-specialist can understand. Technical writing, published research or expert witness experience is valuable; a writing sample can demonstrate that background.

Assignments involve sustained reading and writing about misuse scenarios. Experts receive a briefing in advance and may pause or step away without penalty.

Work must exclude classified or export-controlled information and material restricted by an NDA or prepublication review obligation. Existing obligations should be disclosed so assignments can be scoped appropriately.