We are looking for an experienced Protocol Researcher to design and evaluate rules and mechanisms in Monad that keep the system running smoothly. You’ll be designing rules that optimize for true decentralization, economic security, network value accrual, 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.

Requirements

Prior experience/skills:

Excellent knowledge of mechanisms and policies in existing blockchains, with strong opinions on which mechanisms are good or bad. 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, hotstuff) 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 CS background 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 Bonuses:

Previous experience at a L1 or L2 blockchain protocol Experience with applied cryptography Experience with distributed systems Experience with game theory Proficiency in C++ 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. Why work with us

You’ll work on extremely challenging problems with massive potential impact You’ll work with and learn from a small, exceptional team You’ll receive a competitive salary and equity package You’ll shape the culture as an early employee and make impactful contributions from day one You’ll be part of a flat, results-driven organization Your work will be deeply impactful, enabling much cheaper and more efficient decentralized computation and ultimately paving the way for new dapps that improve many people’s lives. Working at Monad Labs means doing challenging work on a high-impact problem with exceptional teammates.

Here are some of the people you’ll work with:

James, performance engineering expert and system architect; previously designed and built ultra-low-latency systems for a top high-frequency trading team at Jump Trading; Ariq, expert at low-level firmware and software programming; previously a senior engineer at Arista Networks, where he served as lead maintainer on multiple linux kernel networking drivers for Arista EOS devices; Aashish, expert systems designer and hacker, previously the first engineer at Pattern Research, a leading crypto HFT firm, where he designed and built the entire trading stack from scratch We think you’ll enjoy working with us, and that you’ll find the work to be extremely impactful and challenging.