AI Engineer Intern

AI Engineer Intern at USA Rare Earth

We are on a mission to become the leading Western supplier of high value rare earth magnets and critical minerals through a supply chain that supports the future state of energy, mobility, and national security. Our dynamic solution solves key domestic rare earth production challenges through optimizing margins, enhancing efficiency, minimizing costs and mitigating technical challenges.

Our early mover advantage positions us to become the first vertically integrated ex-China rare earth supply chain through substantial interest in the Round Top heavy rare earth, lithium and critical minerals deposit in West Texas, a rare earth separation facility with proven extraction methods, and development of the United States’ first rare earth and critical minerals production facility, with scalable production capability. By developing this fully integrated, US-based “mine-to-magnet” critical mineral supply chain, we are poised to become the leading Western supplier.

What You Can Expect

At USA Rare Earth, we are pioneers and problem solvers, technologists and team players. Together, we:

• Build Solutions: If our task was a simple one, it would already be done. We are creative and solution-oriented, and we think outside the box to solve important problems. We know that a range of expertise and technologies is needed for success, and we work across sectors and alongside customers to deliver world-class solutions in sustainable ways.
• Deliver Quality: When we do things, we do them well. We believe that top-tier quality leads to industry competitiveness and we hold ourselves to the highest quality standards. We move fast when executing, while keeping safety, quality and excellence at the forefront in everything we do.
• Lead responsibly: We have a responsibility to the planet, our consumers, our country, and each other. We put safety at the center of all we do, take accountability for our actions, incorporate sustainable practices in our processes and act with the financial best interest of our investors and consumers in mind.
• Win Together: Establishing a rare earth magnet supply chain is a big undertaking – and getting there is a team effort. We communicate openly, work together and challenge each other in pursuit of our goals. With every step we take we learn and get better.

Position Overview

As an AI Engineer Intern, you'll work directly with business stakeholders, scientists, and engineers to design and ship AI-powered tools that improve how we operate, communicate, and make decisions across the mining and processing business unit. This is not a research role. You'll be building things that go into production and get used by real people on real projects. If you've shipped something with LLMs, agents, or data pipelines and you're curious about what those tools look like when applied to hard physical-world problems, this role was designed for you.

Key Responsibilities

• Design and build LLM-powered agents that automate and augment business workflows, ranging from document handling and stakeholder communication to operational Q&A and data retrieval
• Develop conversational interfaces over structured and unstructured data, enabling non-technical users to query operational and business data in plain English
• Integrate external data sources (commodity markets, regulatory filings, industry benchmarks) into internal tools and reporting workflows
• Collaborate with SMEs (engineers, metallurgists, and project managers) to translate domain knowledge into agent behavior, prompts, and retrieval pipelines
• Contribute to a shared Python codebase, including object-oriented modules for process modeling and data transformation
• Participate in sprint reviews and stakeholder demos, iterating rapidly based on feedback from end users

Knowledge, Skills & Abilities

Minimum Requirements:

• Currently enrolled in a BS (junior or senior standing) or MS program in Computer Science, Data Science, Software Engineering, Applied Mathematics, or a related field
• Demonstrated experience shipping an AI/ML product or tool — portfolio, GitHub, or prior internship evidence required
• Proficiency in Python, including working with APIs, data structures, and third-party libraries
• Hands-on experience with at least one LLM framework or toolchain (e.g., LangChain, LlamaIndex, OpenAI/Anthropic APIs, Haystack)
• Comfort working with structured data (SQL or Pandas) and unstructured data (PDFs, text corpora)
• Strong written communication: you'll be writing prompts, specs, and documentation alongside code

Nice To Have:

• Currently working on a PhD in Computer Science, AI, Data Science, Software Engineering, or similar
• Experience with retrieval-augmented generation (RAG), vector databases (Pinecone, Weaviate, ChromaDB), or embedding pipelines
• Familiarity with industrial, scientific, or time-series data (SCADA, historians, lab reports, assay data)
• Background or coursework in a physical science or engineering discipline (e.g. mining, metallurgy, chemical engineering, geology, or similar)
• Experience building multi-step or tool-using agents
• Exposure to BI tools or data visualization (PowerBI, Streamlit)
• Prior internship or project work in an industrial, energy, or materials company

Physical Demands

The work environment will be a mix of a typical office environment, a manufacturing floor and a construction site. Noise level: Normal office, manufacturing and construction noises. The physical demands described here are representative of those that must be met by an employee to successfully perform the essential functions of this job. Reasonable accommodations may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions.

Equal Employment Opportunity

USA Rare Earth proudly supports Equal Employment Opportunities. USA Rare Earth's policy is to provide equal employment opportunities to all applicants and will provide reasonable accommodations according to applicable federal, state, and/or local laws. For assistance applying for employment through this site due to disability, please contact People & Culture, people@usare.com, to discuss reasonable accommodations.

Key skills/competency

• AI Engineer Intern
• LLM
• Python
• Machine Learning
• Data Science
• Software Engineering
• APIs
• Data Structures
• Agent Development
• Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG)