Senior Researcher, Mechanism Design

Category Labs (formerly known as Monad Labs) is a team of systems engineers and researchers on a mission to design and build at the frontier of decentralized technology. We strive to design and build step-function improvements over existing blockchain solutions. After recently raising $225M in series A funding, led by Paradigm, we are growing our team.

The Role

We are looking for an exceptional Senior Researcher with significant academic and applied experience in economics, particularly in the context of permissionless blockchains. You will play a leading role in designing rules and mechanisms in Monad that keep the decentralized network running smoothly. You’ll be designing mechanisms that optimize for decentralization, economic security, spam prevention, compatibility with existing infrastructure, and ease of use.

You will work closely with our engineering team to design and test various mechanisms. You’ll draw on your extensive knowledge and opinions on mechanisms in existing blockchains to evaluate options for Monad’s design that optimize its security, decentralization, and performance. You’ll work on a variety of areas, such as transaction ordering, staking, and consensus. Most importantly, your work will help our team avoid security threats and the threat of centralization.

Your work will be vital to Monad’s success and will allow Monad to scale safely to hundreds of millions of users.

What you’ll be doing

• You’ll design and evaluate mechanisms that optimize for economic security, decentralization, performance, compatibility with existing infrastructure, and ease of use. A few example areas include transaction ordering (PGA vs flashbots/PBS); staking; liquid staking; spam prevention; on-chain randomness; light clients.

• You’ll evaluate potential attack vectors and evaluate ways to mitigate the threat of attacks.

• You’ll advise the team on technical merits of other systems that are potential partners, such as bridges and DeFi protocols.

• You’ll stay up to date on mechanism design in other blockchains and develop opinions on various practices

• You’ll collaborate with our engineering team to design and test new mechanism options.

• You’ll write about your findings for both internal and public audiences.

Who You Are

Prior experience/skills:

• Excellent knowledge of mechanisms and policies in existing blockchains, with strong opinions on the strengths and weaknesses of existing mechanisms. Example areas we’d expect you to have good knowledge of:

  • Transaction ordering/MEV (both mechanically how MEV “works” in Ethereum, including architectural changes post-Merge, and its consequences, e.g. to decentralization)

  • Staking and economic security (delegation economics; slashing conditions; stake pools)

  • Consensus mechanisms (pBFT, tendermint, Gasper)

  • Spam prevention

  • Trustlessness and decentralization (light clients; merkle proofs; security guarantees of various L1s and rollups)

• Excellent knowledge of major DeFi primitives (AMMs, bridges, oracles, etc)

• Excellent technical communication skills

Required personal attributes:

• Extreme technical curiosity

• Attention to detail

• Creativity

• Resourcefulness and independence

• Clarity of thought

• Enthusiasm about learning and teaching

• Enthusiasm for Monad’s mission of enabling far more decentralized computation

Nice to have:

• Previous experience at a L1 or L2 blockchain protocol

• Experience with applied cryptography

• Experience with distributed systems

• Experience with game theory

• Ability to code, e.g. for implementing simulations

Why Work with Us

• Challenging problems. You’ll work on extremely challenging problems with massive impact. See our Blogs and Papers & Talks for a flavor of the problems we are solving in the real world.

• Huge opportunity. The Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) standard is ubiquitous, but existing EVM-compatible chains are very slow. Monad’s core innovations offer developers the best of both worlds (portability and performance) and are a game-changer for mass user adoption in crypto.

• The right team. You’ll be part of an exceptional team.

• Culture. We’re a lean team working together to achieve very ambitious goals. We are united in our culture of collaboration, low egos, and high-quality outputs. As an early member of our team, you’ll help continue to shape our culture.

• Compensation. You’ll receive a competitive salary and equity package.

• Resources and growth. We’re well-capitalized, with backing from leading venture funds like Paradigm, Electric Capital, Greenoaks, Dragonfly, and Coinbase Ventures. We keep a lean team, and this is a rare opportunity to join. You’ll learn a lot and grow as our company scales.

Salary and Benefits

Target full-time salary of $250,000. (**This is not a guarantee of compensation or salary; a final offer amount may vary based on factors including but not limited to experience, domain expertise, and geographic location.)

Benefits for US employees include:

• World class benefits package (medical/dental/vision)

• Unlimited paid time off

• 401(k) retirement plan + company match

• Lunch and dinner stipend (in-office NYC)

• Monthly wellness benefit

• Paid parental leave