Senior Applied AI Research Scientist

Location: Bristol (Hybrid)

Job Type: Permanent | Full-Time

Salary: £90,000 – £120,000 + Equity + Benefits

What if your research could shape the future of robotics?

Are you a Senior Applied AI Research Scientist working in Robotics, Machine Learning, Embodied AI or Foundation Models?

Do you want access to real humanoid robots, large-scale AI training infrastructure, and the freedom to explore breakthrough technologies that could define robot intelligence over the next five years?

A pioneering robotics company is seeking a Senior Applied AI Research Scientist to drive next-generation research in robotics foundation models, embodied AI and advanced robot learning.

The Role

As a Senior Applied AI Research Scientist, you will evaluate emerging AI technologies, build research prototypes, benchmark new approaches and influence the long-term direction of robot intelligence systems.

Working alongside robotics engineers, AI researchers and platform teams, the Senior Applied AI Research Scientist will help identify the technologies that will power future generations of intelligent robotic systems.

Key Responsibilities

• Research robotics foundation models, embodied AI and advanced robot learning systems
• Design and execute large-scale AI and robotics experiments
• Build benchmark frameworks to evaluate robot intelligence and manipulation capabilities
• Develop research prototypes that demonstrate next-generation robotic capabilities
• Publish research findings and contribute to technical strategy and innovation programmes

Areas of Interest

We welcome applications from candidates with expertise in one or more of the following:

• Vision Language Action (VLA) Models
• Robotics Foundation Models
• Embodied AI
• Reinforcement Learning
• World Models
• Diffusion Policies
• Multimodal Learning
• Behaviour Cloning
• Sim-to-Real Transfer
• Dexterous Manipulation
• Long-Horizon Planning
• Large-Scale Model Training

Essential Requirements

• MSc, PhD or equivalent industry experience in AI, Machine Learning, Robotics, Computer Science or related discipline
• Strong understanding of modern machine learning and deep learning techniques
• Experience designing and executing research programmes
• Strong Python programming skills
• Experience training and evaluating machine learning models
• Ability to independently drive research from concept through to meaningful outcomes
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills

Desirable Experience

• Publications at leading AI, Machine Learning or Robotics conferences
• Experience with robot learning on physical hardware
• Foundation model training experience
• Reinforcement learning for manipulation tasks
• Experience within research-led startups, scale-ups or innovation environments

What's On Offer?

• Competitive salary package
• Equity/share options
• Private healthcare
• Conference attendance and research publication support
• Access to advanced humanoid robotic platforms
• Cloud-scale AI training infrastructure
• Flexible working arrangements
• Clear opportunity to influence the future of embodied AI and robotics

Apply

If you're a Senior Applied AI Research Scientist looking to work on some of the most exciting challenges in robotics, foundation models and embodied AI, we'd love to hear from you.

Apply today or contact OpenSourced Recruitment for a confidential discussion.