About the Role

As a Protocol Research Engineer at Raiku, you’ll dive deep into Solana’s consensus mechanisms, validator dynamics, and block-building edge cases to help push the boundaries of what’s possible on-chain. Your work will directly inform and evolve Raiku’s infrastructure — including ahead-of-time auctions, deterministic inclusion, and decentralized execution environments.

This role is ideal for an engineer who obsesses over protocol-level behavior, from slashing conditions and fork choice rules to novel token incentive structures and inclusion guarantees. You will collaborate closely with our core engineering team, lead technical research deep-dives, and shape future SIMD proposals and Raiku-native designs.

Core Responsibilities

Protocol Research & Development

• Analyze Solana protocol changes (SIMDs) and model their impact on consensus, block production, and validator incentives.
• Explore alternative leader schedules, transaction scheduling policies, and failure recovery mechanisms.
• Design and prototype changes to Raiku’s validator sidecar, ackermann-node, and execution environment logic.

Incentives & Economics

• Simulate and reason about token-level economics (e.g. fee markets, slot auctions, stake redistribution) in the context of Raiku’s architecture.
• Collaborate with the team on reward structures that align validators, apps, and execution primitives.
• Contribute to internal tooling for simulating validator behavior under new fee models or coordination layers.

Research & Thought Leadership

• Write internal memos and public-facing research exploring protocol edge cases, inclusion determinism, and priority fee market design.
• Lead technical discussions and workshops across the team and ecosystem partners.
• Represent Raiku in upstream governance and protocol forums (e.g., GitHub SIMDs, community calls).

What We’re Looking For

• Deep understanding of Solana’s architecture, consensus algorithm (Tower BFT), and validator mechanics.
• Proficiency in systems programming (Rust or C++) and experience working with validator or node clients (Agave, Jito, etc.).
• Comfort reasoning about distributed systems, forks, slashing, transaction lifecycle, and fee markets.
• Demonstrated ability to write clear, technical research — either internal design docs or public content.
• A rigorous, systems-level thinker who thrives in ambiguity and wants to help shape the frontier of internet-scale consensus.

Bonus Points

• Experience contributing to SIMD proposals or L1 protocol development (Solana, Cosmos, Ethereum, etc.).
• Familiarity with execution environments (SVM, EVM, Move) or decentralized scheduling infrastructure.
• Interest in MEV mitigation, slot auctions, or validator tokenomics.
• Past experience in distributed systems research, zero-knowledge design, or compiler/runtime engineering.

Why Join Raiku?

Raiku is building a high-performance execution layer atop Solana that enables guaranteed transaction inclusion, pre-confirmations, and slot-level coordination — unlocking a new design space for ultra-reliable onchain apps. We’re backed by leading investors, deeply technical, and shipping fast.

• Work with a world-class engineering team building core infrastructure from first principles.
• Help define the next evolution of block production and validator coordination on Solana.
• Remote-first, async culture optimized for focus, ownership, and velocity.
• Competitive salary + meaningful token upside.
• Home office and workstation setup stipend.

About Aztec At Aztec, our goal is to add privacy to Ethereum. In the current public blockchain paradigm, users and entities unknowingly broadcast data in the public, compromising privacy and security to get trustlessness. Not only are unencrypted blockchains inherently privacy-exposing, they require significant redundancy to compute and verify the legitimacy of transactions. Implementing scalable encryption in a public blockchain paradigm requires cutting-edge math and engineering. Thankfully, our team of scientists and engineers invented Plonk, the industry-standard zkSNARK, and Noir, the universal language of zero knowledge. Now, we’re building a first of its kind Layer 2 with private smart contracts. This requires new cryptographic primitives, a zero-knowledge DSL for writing contracts, a privacy-friendly execution environment, a carefully designed set of circuits that prove the validity of the chain to L1, a decentralized block-building and proving mechanism, and a top-tier user and developer experience. And it’s now time to bring it to market. We’ve raised $125 million from industry-leading investors including a16z crypto, Paradigm, Variant, Consensys, and a_capital, and we’re growing quickly.Role Overview As a Front-End Software Engineer at Aztec Labs, you’ll be at the forefront of designing and developing intuitive, high-performance user interfaces for developers and users interacting with our zkApps, wallets, and protocol tools. You will collaborate with design, cryptography, and protocol teams to ensure seamless and secure user experiences in a highly technical, fast-paced environment. This is a unique opportunity to help define the UX of privacy in Web3 and shape how users interact with next-gen decentralized systems. Key Responsibilities

Design, implement, and maintain front-end applications for zk-powered tools and dApps. Initial projects in the first months will be designing and developing the frontends for our showcase payment dApp and sequencer staking bootstrap projects, critical for our mainnet launch this year. Work closely with product managers to align UI/UX with product requirements. Work closely with engineers to integrate aztec.js into the apps and provide critical feedback. Create and translate design mockups and wireframes into pixel-perfect, responsive interfaces. Write modular, testable, and maintainable code using modern JavaScript frameworks. Contribute to UI/UX discussions and drive decisions around user experience best practices. Ensure performance, security, and scalability of all front-end applications.

Required Qualifications

3+ years of experience building production-grade front-end applications. Strong proficiency in TypeScript, JavaScript, React or Svelte, and HTML/CSS. A deep understanding of frontend performance optimization, accessibility, and responsive design. A focused, and minimalist approach to engineering and design, avoiding bloat, and keeping the code easy for everyone to maintain. Strong communication and collaboration skills. You will be expected to develop a deep understanding of the requirements, and can then take the initiative to meet them with minimal management. Passion for blockchain technology and a strong desire to build user-first Web3 applications.

Nice to Have

Experience working with Web3 libraries (e.g., ethers.js, viem, wagmi). Familiarity with zero-knowledge proofs, privacy-preserving technologies, or blockchain protocols. Previous contributions to crypto wallets, block explorers, or dApp front-ends. Understanding of UX design principles and familiarity with Figma or design systems. Experience with end-to-end testing frameworks (e.g., Cypress, Playwright). Exposure to Layer 2 solutions and Ethereum development tools.

What we offer:

A highly competitive compensation package (including equity) Flexible and remote work environment based out of London 25 days holiday + bank holidays annually An opportunity to work at the cutting edge of blockchain with a world class cryptography and engineering team Aztec Labs is an equal opportunity employer and we value creativity, diversity, and intellectual curiosity. If you're passionate about leveraging your creative talents to make a real-world impact, and if you want to be part of a team that's shaping the future of digital privacy, then we would love to hear from you.

Apply Now:

Who are we?

We believe Ethereum has the potential to solve some of humanity’s most crucial coordination issues. Since our initial inception as a research group, we have sought to scale both its technology and values.

At present, the most pressing bottleneck to the growth of Ethereum is its performance and scalability. We are building the most elegant solution to this problem. We do this in the open (under an MIT open source license) because we believe in open source innovation and its ability to accelerate growth.

OP Labs contributes to the Optimism protocol, an extension to Ethereum that scales both its technology and values. Optimism enables orders of magnitude of improved performance and scalability to Ethereum while doubling down on its commitment to public goods.

The Optimism Collective leads the blockchain protocol landscape, dedicated to fostering a scalable and sustainable ecosystem. Optimism’s ethos, in sync with Ethereum's vision, tackles pivotal coordination challenges of the digital age. Optimism’s goal is to harmonize private incentives with public good, shaping a resilient future for the Internet. Optimism’s scope spans diverse areas like Gaming, DeFi, NFTs, and Enterprise.

Position Overview:

The Proofs team is looking for an experienced software engineer. We’re developing the infrastructure that enables the secure and permissionless withdrawal of funds from OP Stack chains and the Superchain.

We’re developing the Optimism fault proof system, which is already in production, and evolving it to support “stage 2” decentralization with multiple proof systems, including ZK validity proofs.

What are the role responsibilities?

• Evolve our proof system to meet stage 2 requirements using dispute games and/or validity proofs.

• Contribute to important Go-based and possibly Rust-based Ethereum and OP Stack infrastructure, for example Cannon, the Fault Proof VM.

• Work with other teams and other disciplines within OP Labs, and with our ecosystem of external developers and partners.

What skills do you bring?

• Proven experience developing in Go, Rust, or another similar language.

• Blockchain development experience.

• Experience in systems programming, ideally in developing low-level software such as virtual machines, interpreters, or compilers.

• Excellent written and verbal communication skills, with the ability to document technical details clearly and collaborate effectively with team members.

• Strong understanding of cryptographic principles.

• Experience with Zero Knowledge Proofs or ZK VMs is a nice-to-have.

What will you like about us?

• We take care of our employees. Competitive compensation, fully paid medical, dental, and vision, and a 4% 401K match—learn more about our benefits, culture, and all recruiting FAQ here.

• We take pride in the accomplishments of our teammates and support each other in doing the best work of our careers.

• Our team is a diverse group of people from varied backgrounds. We cherish our eclecticism and consider it a great strength.

• We’re fully remote, deeply engaged, highly skilled, and like to have fun.

• We think long-term. Our founders have been scaling Ethereum since 2015.

Apply Now:

Polygon is looking to hire a Developer Evangelist - DeFi to join their team. This is a full-time position that is 100% remote with no geographical restrictions. Work remotely from anywhere.

Polygon - The fundamental protocol that allows anyone to create and exchange value, powered by zero-knowledge technology.