Research Intern Redmond WA

Overview

Research Internships at Microsoft offer a dynamic setting for research careers, with a network of world-class research labs led by globally recognized scientists and engineers. They pursue innovation across scientific and technical disciplines to solve complex challenges in computing, healthcare, economics, and the environment.

The Office of Applied Research at Microsoft brings together experts in frontier Artificial Intelligence (AI) model development and human-centered AI to tackle real-world challenges at scale in the enterprise AI space. The team works closely with research and product partners to keep Microsoft's research aligned with core product interests.

Applied research is impact-driven. It applies empirical techniques to real-world problems, turning theory into practice while advancing the state of the art.

Strong candidates have proven experience in areas such as Generative AI, Large Language Models (LLMs), Natural Language Processing (NLP), Reinforcement Learning (RL), learning from human feedback, and Human-centered AI. The team is particularly interested in reinforcement learning, model mid- and post-training, continual learning, differential privacy, human-AI collaboration, and the development and evaluation of enterprise AI agents, including learning from user feedback in real-world deployments.

Responsibilities

Research Interns put inquiry and theory into practice, working alongside doctoral candidates and some of the world's leading researchers. Interns advance their own careers while contributing to research and development progress.

During the 12-week internship, Research Interns are paired with mentors and collaborate with other interns and researchers, present findings, and take part in the community. Research internships cover all areas of research and are offered year-round, though they typically begin in the summer.

Other Requirements

• Research Interns must be physically located at their manager's Microsoft worksite for the duration of the internship.
• Applicants must submit at least two reference letters, a cover letter, and any relevant work or research samples. Reference letters can only be requested after the application is submitted, and they may not be requested for every candidate, so letter writers should be alerted in advance.

Preferred Qualifications

• 1+ year of experience conducting research and writing peer-reviewed publications.
• Ability to think unconventionally to develop creative and innovative solutions.
• Active research in at least one of the following areas: Collaborative or multi-party AI agents, mid- and post-training for LLMs and agents, learning from user interaction or feedback, synthetic data generation for LLM evaluation and fine-tuning, understanding, verifying, or evaluating LLM outputs, differential privacy for LLMs and data, continual learning or test-time training, agents (memory, goal management, inter-agent conversations), multi-agent simulations, and forward deployment for enterprise AI.
• Ability to collaborate effectively with a mentor and others at Microsoft on research projects.
• Strong interpersonal and communication skills, with cross-group and cross-culture collaboration skills.

Microsoft is an equal opportunity employer. Applicants receive consideration without regard to age, ancestry, citizenship, color, family or medical care leave, gender identity or expression, genetic information, immigration status, marital status, medical condition, national origin, physical or mental disability, political affiliation, protected veteran or military status, race, ethnicity, religion, sex, sexual orientation, or any other protected characteristic. Accommodation requests can be made through the Microsoft accessibility page.