Astronomy / Astrophysics Quality Assurance Lead (QAL)

Job Summary

As an Astronomy / Astrophysics Quality Assurance Lead (QAL), you will oversee quality, consistency, and contributor performance across astronomy and astrophysics AI training projects.

You will review AI-generated astronomy and astrophysics content, scientific explanations, calculations, observational analyses, diagrams, and trainer/QA submissions to ensure outputs are scientifically accurate, mathematically correct, physically sound, and aligned with project standards.

Your work will directly contribute to improving advanced AI systems by ensuring astronomy and astrophysics training data is rigorous, well-documented, and grounded in accepted scientific principles.

Key Responsibilities

Quality Monitoring

• Review astronomy and astrophysics tasks and QA outputs
• Identify recurring quality issues and provide detailed written feedback
• Escalate critical quality concerns

Scientific Review

• Review and evaluate astronomy explanations, astrophysics calculations, observational interpretations, cosmology content, stellar evolution analyses, planetary science discussions, scientific comparisons, and step-by-step scientific reasoning
• Assess work for scientific accuracy, physical reasoning, mathematical correctness, unit consistency, terminology accuracy, observational context, clarity, instruction adherence, and rubric compliance

Trainer & QA Communication

• Communicate guidelines, workflow changes, quality standards, astronomy review expectations, and evaluation criteria

Contributor Support

• Answer questions involving physical assumptions, scientific formulas, unit conversions, astronomy terminology, observational methods, cosmology concepts, scientific interpretation, and rubric application

Activation Management

• Follow up with inactive contributors, track engagement and participation, escalate availability concerns when needed

Documentation & Onboarding

• Create and maintain style guides, documentation, FAQs, quality notes, examples, calibration tasks, and onboarding resources
• Conduct onboarding and training sessions for contributors

Risk & Scientific Integrity Review

• Identify and flag incorrect calculations, wrong units, physically impossible claims, unsupported conclusions, hallucinated scientific facts, misleading explanations, oversimplified interpretations, invalid assumptions, numerically incorrect outputs, and overconfident scientific claims

Process Improvement

• Improve QA workflows and identify recurring quality gaps
• Develop scalable astronomy and astrophysics review processes

Required Qualifications

• Bachelor's, Master's, PhD, or equivalent background in Astronomy, Astrophysics, Physics, Space Science, Planetary Science, Cosmology, or related scientific disciplines
• Strong English communication skills
• Minimum 3 years of experience in astronomy research, astrophysics research, teaching, scientific writing, academic review, observatory work, data analysis, or science communication
• Strong understanding of Celestial Mechanics, Stellar Evolution, Galaxies, Cosmology, Electromagnetic Radiation, Spectroscopy, Photometry, Planetary Systems, Black Holes, and Scientific Uncertainty
• Ability to identify incorrect physical assumptions, invalid scientific reasoning, calculation errors, unit inconsistencies, misleading explanations, and unsupported conclusions

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience with Python, Jupyter Notebooks, Scientific Visualization, LaTeX, Astronomical Datasets, Telescope Data, Observatory Data, Simulations, Spectroscopy Analysis, and Photometry Workflows
• Experience with AI Training, Data Annotation, LLM Evaluation, Scientific QA, Academic Review, and Rubric-Based Evaluation

Why Join

• Help improve leading AI systems through astronomy and astrophysics quality assurance
• Flexible remote schedule
• Weekly payments
• Access to future opportunities through SME Careers' expert network

Selection Process

1. AI Interview
2. Domain Assessment
3. Recruiter Interview

Important Note

There is currently no active project for this role. Qualified candidates will be added to the SME Careers expert network and contacted when astronomy or astrophysics opportunities become available.