Job Summary:
Mariana Minerals is a software-first, vertically integrated minerals company on a mission to supply the critical minerals powering modern energy, AI, and defense technologies. They are seeking a Staff Machine Learning Engineer to set the technical direction for autonomous refining operations, focusing on building, validating, and optimizing control models across their facilities. This role involves solving complex modeling problems and collaborating with leadership to shape the autonomy roadmap.
Responsibilities:
โข Own the autonomy roadmap across multiple circuits and facilitiesโdeciding which unit operations to automate next and where investment in simulation and modeling pays off.
โข Define how control models are validated and certified safe to deploy on real refining equipment, including how the gap between simulation and reality is measured and closed.
โข Set the standards for our simulators and our modeling stack, so the whole team builds controllers that are reproducible, safe, and grounded in real project economics.
โข Personally solve the hardest modeling and control problemsโnon-stationarity, safety constraints, and multi-objective optimization across recovery, reagent use, energy, and uptime.
โข Partner with leadership on major capital and operational decisions, translating techno-economic and process insight into strategy.
โข Multiply the team through technical direction, design review, and mentoring of engineers at every levelโand partner with our data engineering leaders to shape the data platform the autonomy roadmap requires. You own the modeling and the on-plant outcome; they own the backbone.
Qualifications:
Required:
โข 8+ years in machine learning engineering (or an exceptional 6+ with demonstrated org-level technical leadership), including production ML or control systems that ran in the real world.
โข A track record of setting technical direction for ML systems in physical, industrial, robotics, or control domains.
โข Deep expertise in reinforcement learning under non-stationarity, simulation and digital twins, and closing sim-to-real gapsโplus the judgment to know when a simpler approach wins.
โข Demonstrated ability to de-risk ambiguous, never-been-done problems: framing the objective, the success metric, and the path for others.
โข Strong cross-functional influence with both technical leadership and domain expertsโchemists, metallurgists, process engineers, and geologists.
โข A builder at heart. Staff engineers here still ship.
Company:
Mariana Minerals is a software-first, vertically integrated minerals company focused on supplying the minerals critical to modern energy, AI, and defense technologies. Founded in , the company is headquartered in San Francisco, CA, US, , with a team of 51-200 employees. The company is currently Growth Stage.