Phd Internship Jobs in Reston, VA (NOW HIRING)

Atalanta is a mathematical AI company bringing provably correct decision-making to the world’s most important missions.

Our flagship product, Argo, is the first platform in a new category called software understanding. Argo combines AI, formal methods, and digital engineering to help organizations design, implement, and deploy complex software-controlled systems with mathematical assurance at mission speed.

Backed by leading investors, Atalanta works with customers building and deploying mission-critical systems across energy, space, and defense. Our goal is to help engineers and mission owners move faster while maintaining the highest possible level of assurance, ultimately saving time, money, and lives.

Atalanta takes its name from the mythological Greek heroine, a swift and fearless competitor who defied expectations and joined the Argonauts on a mission few thought possible. Her spirit of speed, discipline, and resilience shapes how we work.

We’re building a team of modern-day Argonauts: exceptional engineers, mathematicians, designers, and strategists committed to solving the hardest, highest-stakes problems in the world. We move fast, but we do so with discipline and logic. We think from first principles and execute with autonomy and accountability.

You may be a good fit for Atalanta if you are insatiably curious in the face of discomfort, are a coalition builder who sees progress as a positive-sum game, and believe that the alchemy of interdisciplinary expertise can solve seemingly impossible problems.

Software understanding is a constantly evolving discipline, and maintaining leadership in this category requires continuously advancing both how the problem is defined and how the solution is built. Atalanta’s research function exists to stay ahead of this curve, grounded in what is learned from real missions and real deployments. This work spans disciplines, combining political science to understand the rapidly changing geopolitical landscape and emerging threat models, with computer science to push the technical frontier across AI, mathematics, and cybersecurity. Research is pursued through both internal efforts and partnerships with leading universities and research institutions, ensuring a constant exchange between frontier ideas and operational reality. This work is exploratory, but never abstract, shaped by the belief that research should directly inform what is built and deployed. Success means that Atalanta not only leads the software understanding category today, but continues to define what it becomes tomorrow.

As a Software Understanding Researcher at Atalanta, you will help advance the frontier of AI-driven reasoning and verification for complex systems. Your work will focus on combining machine learning with formal methods to build systems that can reason about, verify, and guarantee behavior in real-world environments.

In this role, you will:

• Conduct research at the intersection of machine learning, automated reasoning, and formal verification, with a focus on building AI systems that can reason about code and system behavior.
• Develop novel approaches for integrating large language models with symbolic reasoning, program analysis, program synthesis, or theorem proving.
• Design and implement algorithms for specification, verification, and synthesis of complex systems under real-world constraints.
• Prototype and evaluate new techniques on real systems, and work with engineers to integrate them into Argo.
• Advance the state of the art in scalable reasoning systems that improve reliability, security, and correctness in deployed software.

We are looking for:

• Current PhD student in computer science, mathematics, electrical engineering, or a related technical field.
• Strong background in machine learning, AI, or automated reasoning, with experience in areas such as LLMs, reinforcement learning, formal verification, or program analysis.
• Experience designing and implementing novel algorithms or models, with evidence of research contributions or publications.
• Familiarity with programming languages and systems relevant to reasoning and verification (e.g., Python, Rust, C++, or theorem proving environments).
• Ability to bridge theory and practice, translating research ideas into working prototypes.
• Strong technical communication skills, with the ability to clearly articulate complex ideas and collaborate across engineering teams.
• Eligibility for a TS/SCI security clearance (U.S. citizenship required.)

The salary for this position is estimated to be $150,000 - $180,000 per year, prorated for the duration of the internship. Candidates will also be eligible to receive a relocation bonus if applicable.

Other benefits include:

• Generous paid time off.
• Weekly meals and other on-site amenities at Atalanta HQ.

Atalanta is an equal opportunity employer committed to building a diverse team aligned by mission, technical expertise, and impact.