Lab Manager

About Mariana Minerals Mariana Minerals is a software-first, vertically integrated minerals company on a mission to supply the critical minerals powering modern energy, AI, and defense technologies. We’re reimagining the minerals supply chain by combining deep industry expertise with advanced software, automation, and data-driven decision-making. The Role Mariana Minerals is seeking a highly organized and technically strong Lab Manager to build and lead the analytical laboratory supporting our DSM Pilot Plant in Houston. The DSM pilot couples a high temperature pyrometallurgical section with a downstream hydrometallurgical refining section, so the laboratory has to handle everything from feeds, calcines, slags, and dusts to leach solutions, loaded and stripped organics, precipitates, products, and effluent. You will stand the laboratory up from an empty room: equipment selection and commissioning, method development and validation, QA/QC systems, staffing, and the data workflows that connect results to plant decisions. Once the plant is running, you own turnaround time and data quality for round-the-clock campaigns, where an assay result can determine whether the plant keeps running. What you'll do Build and lead the laboratory Lead daily laboratory operations supporting pilot plant campaigns, process development, and product qualification Specify, purchase, install, and commission analytical instrumentation and sample preparation equipment for a new laboratory, and manage the associated capital and operating budgets Supervise, mentor, and develop analytical chemists and technicians, including hiring, training and qualification records, scheduling, and performance reviews Own the analytical program Oversee analytical testing using ICP-OES, ICP-MS, XRF, XRD, titration, ion chromatography, and other relevant techniques Own sample preparation for difficult mineral matrices, including crushing, pulverizing, splitting, drying, loss on ignition, acid digestion, and fusion of refractory materials Establish, validate, and continuously improve analytical methods for high matrix solutions such as concentrated leach liquors, high salt streams, and organic phases from solvent extraction Support pyrometallurgical characterization needs including elemental assay of feeds, calcines, slags, dusts, and residues, along with moisture, LOI, carbon and sulfur, and particle size analysis Manage external and umpire laboratory relationships for methods held outside the site, including sample shipping, turnaround, and result reconciliation Provide analytical inputs to mass balance and metallurgical accounting, and work with process engineers to resolve balance closure issues Quality, data, and systems Develop and enforce laboratory SOPs, QA/QC protocols, and data validation procedures, including certified reference materials, duplicates, spikes, blanks, and control charting Collaborate with process and plant engineering on sampling-point design and validation, covering location, sampler type, frequency, and sample handling, and confirm that each point delivers a representative sample before it is relied on for process decisions. Own detection limits, precision and accuracy targets, and documented uncertainty for every reported method Implement and administer a laboratory information management system or equivalent digital data workflow, including sample chain of custody from the plant floor to the reported result Set and hold turnaround time commitments by priority tier, so operations receives time-critical results fast enough to act on them Maintain and oversee calibration, preventive maintenance, and troubleshooting of analytical instrumentation, and manage service contracts and vendor relationships Manage laboratory inventory including consumables, gases, standards, and reagents Safety and compliance Ensure compliance with safety regulations, the chemical hygiene plan, and environmental requirements Own safe handling, storage, and segregation…

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