Volunteer Research Staff

PathOnAI.org
Millbrae, CA

About PathOnAI.org

                                                                                   

 PathOnAI.org is a 501(c)(3) non-profit, open-source AI research organization focused on advancing Open-Source Robotics and AI Agent Technology. Our mission is to

 democratize state-of-the-art AI methods, making them more accessible and easier to implement.                                    

          

 Recent highlights:                                                                         

 - Winner, SF LeRobot Robotics Hackathon 2025

 - 6 peer-reviewed papers accepted at top venues: KDD GenAIRecP '24, CIKM '24, WWW '25, NAACL '25, ECML-PKDD '25, and MTI-LLM @ NeurIPS 2025             

 - Website: https://www.pathonai.org/

                                                                                   

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 About the Role                                                                           

          

 We are recruiting Volunteer Research Staff to join our dexterous manipulation research effort. You will collaborate with our team on cutting-edge research with a

 clear deliverable: publish a paper at a top-tier venue and/or release an impactful open-source repository.                             

  

 What you'll work on:                                                                        

 - Research and development in dexterous manipulation (grasping, in-hand manipulation, tactile sensing, learning-based control, sim-to-real)

 - Designing experiments, running benchmarks, and analyzing results                                                 

 - Contributing to open-source code, datasets, and documentation  

 - Co-authoring academic papers and technical blog posts                                                       

          

 Who we're looking for:                                                                       

 - Background in robotics, machine learning, computer vision, or a related field (students, early-career researchers, and experienced engineers all welcome)

 - Hands-on experience with at least one of: PyTorch, ROS/ROS2, MuJoCo, Isaac Sim/Gym, IsaacLab, robot learning frameworks                      

 - Familiarity with robot arms, grippers, or dexterous hands is a plus                           

 - Self-driven, collaborative, and excited to ship research in the open                                               

 - Able to commit ~10+ hours per week                                                                

                                                                                   

 What you'll gain:                                                                          

 - Authorship on publications and open-source releases                                                        

 - Mentorship from a team with a track record at top AI/ML venues                                                  

 - Access to real robot hardware and simulation infrastructure  

 - A strong network in the open-source robotics + AI agent community

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