Germany:PhD and Post-Doc Positions in Robotics and Machine Learning

Application Deadline: There is no fixed deadline: the positions will be filled as soon as possible.

The Intelligent Autonomous Systems Lab (IAS) at the Technical University of Darmstadt (TU Darmstadt) is seeking for several highly qualified postdoctoral researchers as well astalented Ph.D. students with strong interests in one or more of the following research topics:

    Machine Learning for Robotics (especially Reinforcement Learning, Imitation, and Model
     Learning).
    Tactile Exploration, Robot Grasping and Manipulation.
    Interaction Learning, Intent Modeling and Inference.
    Whole-body Contacts in Humanoid Robotics.
    Robot Control, Learning for Control.
    Robot Table Tennis.

Outstanding students and researchers from the areas of robotics and robotics-related areas including machine learning, control engineering or computer vision are welcome to apply. The candidates are expected to conduct independent research and at the same time contribute to ongoing projects in the areas listed above. Successful candidates can furthermore be given the opportunity to work with undergraduate, M.Sc. and Ph.D. students.

Due to IAS' strong ties to the Max Planck Institutes for Intelligent Systems and Biological Cybernetics, the University of Southern California, as well as to the Honda Research Institute, there will be ample opportunities of collaboration with these institutes.

Position Requirements

Ph.D. position applicants need to have a Master's degree in a relevant field (e.g., Robotics, Computer Science, Engineering, Statistics & Optimization, Math and Physics) and have exhibited their ability to perform research in either robotics or machine learning.

A successful Post-doc applicant should have a strong robotics and/or machine learning background with a track record of top-tier research publications, including relevant  conferences (e.g., RSS, ICRA, IROS or ICML, IJCAI, AAAI, NIPS, AISTATS) and journals (e.g., AURO, TRo, IJRR or JMLR, MLJ, Neural Computation) . A Ph.D. in Computer Science, Electrical or Mechanical Engineering (or another field clearly related to robotics and/or machine learning) as well as strong organizational and coordination skills are a must.

Expertise in working with real robot systems is a big plus for all applicants.

How to Apply?

All complete applications submitted through our online application system found at

Application Website>>>

will be considered. There is no fixed deadline: the positions will be filled as soon as possible. Ph.D. applicants should provide at least a research statement, a PDF with their CV, degrees, and grade-sheets, and two references who are willing to write a recommendation letter. PostDoc applicants require three references and, in addition, should provide their top three publications. Please ensure to include a link to your research web-site as well as your date of availability.

Applicants are encouraged to contact Jan Peters, Marc Deisenroth, Heni Ben Amor and Gerhard Neumann during the upcoming ICRA, R:SS or ICML. Candidates giving a presentation at one of these conferences are invited to send a corresponding note to us.

More Information Needed?

See Here>>>

Read More

PhD-student in Engineering Sciences (Luxembourg)

Course Level:   PhD 
Application Deadline: 15 June 2013.
Start Date: Earliest September, 2013
Duration: 3-year fixed-term contract, full-time (40h/week) with a possible prolongation of 1 year

The PhD-student will work under the guidance of an associate professor on a doctoral research project and will also contribute to education to a certain extent. She/he should finish the work with a doctoral degree in engineering science.

Your Role

Research project:
Magic – Modeling travel choice processes considering short and long-term planning decisions and application to travel demand management.
This doctoral research project aims to develop new models that integrate short-term and long-term planning decisions in the individual travel scheduling process, based on discrete choice analysis. This new modelling approach will be adopted to assess the impact of designing and organising new and existing collaborative mobility services (collective transport systems, travel and mode sharing services, etc.), which are argued to have a great impact on both daily and weekly activity-travel behaviour, and on long-term decisions such as car ownership and land use development.
Links determining the activity-travel chain of travellers are identified and analysed using data obtained by different personalised information and decision support services (smartphones, personal travel information systems, electronic agendas, digital travel diaries)
and from transportation data (service usage, modal split, scheduling), which are collected and offered from different sources and partner projects.

Your Profile

   1.  Master degree in Civil Engineering (mastering in transportation) or in Human Sciences  domains (e.g. Geography, Spatial Development and Analysis,…)
  2.  Excellent background in discrete choice analysis, transport policy and travel behavior analysis
   3. Knowledge in designing and carrying on travel surveys
   4. Great skills in statistical analysis tools (SPSS, R) and in GIS software (e.g. ArcGIS).
   5. Willingness to inscribe as PhD-student at UL;
   6. Fluent written and verbal communication skills in English are mandatory, knowledge of another communication language such as French or German is also needed.
   7. Commitment, team working, a critical mind, and motivation are skills that are more than welcome

We offer

    Excellent research conditions in an international dynamic research-oriented environment;
    Necessary technology and software for pursuing the research;
    A motivating and interdisciplinary research team;
    Links with research on digital travel surveys (project iGear carried on at Security,       

    Reliability and Trust) and on multimodal and sharing services (projects InCoMMune ,   

    MC-Career Integration Grant approved on May 27, and MAMBA submitted in May 2013).

Further Information
The University offers highly competitive salaries and is an equal opportunity employer.
Applications, written in English should be submitted online by 15th June 2013 and should include:

    Curriculum Vitae (including your contact address, work experience, publications);
    Cover letter indicating the research area of interest and your motivation;
    Copy of the MSc diploma;
    Transcript of all courses and results from the highest university-level courses taken;

The University of Luxembourg is an equal opportunity employer.

For Further Information>>>

Read More

PhD in Pathophysiology and Repair, School of Biosciences (PhD Studentship)

Course Level:  Postgraduate Research 
Application Deadline: 1 July 2013.
Start Date: 1 October 2013
Duration: 3 years
Funding Amount: UK/EU fees and stipend
Scholarship provider: This studentship is generously funded by Tenovus.
  
Eligibility and Funding:     

This studentship is open to UK and EU citizens.  
The award consists of UK/EU fees and a maintenance stipend.  
This will be £13,998 in the first year and is likely to increase in subsequent years.
 
Applicants will need a 2:1 degree (or equivalent) in a relevant subject, or a 2:2 degree   plus a Master's degree (or equivalent qualifications). 

Project title: Targeting cancer stem cells in breast tumours ex vivo

Project description:
In Cardiff School of Biosciences, we have discovered a method to selectively eliminate the tumour-forming potential of breast cancers by destroying the so-called cancer stem cells, thought to be responsible for the spread of the disease in breast cancer patients. These experiments were performed in a laboratory setting using cancer cells that had been propagated for long periods outside of the body. Thus despite the striking anti-cancer effects observed, there remains the key question of whether these findings have direct clinical relevance for breast cancer patients. We aim to address this by testing our putative therapeutic strategy directly on breast tumour tissues.

We have recently obtained ethical consent to acquire fresh tumour biopsy tissues from patients attending a regional Breast Clinic. These tissues will be used to test the experimental therapy over a much shorter time frame in the laboratory, in order to maintain the integrity and therefore the clinical relevance of the human tissues. The therapeutic approach involves suppression of the gene for cFLIP combined with the addition of the anti-cancer agent TRAIL. This induces a highly selective apoptotic response in the tumour-initiating cell population.We will initially use a genetic approach involving lentiviral vectors conditionally expressing shRNA to specifically suppress cFLIP in the primary tumour samples in culture, followed by the addition of TRAIL to the culture medium. We will assess the cytotoxic effects on both cancer stem cells and the tumour as a whole, and will correlate any responses to the particular subtypes of breast cancer. The student will receive comprehensive training in a broad spectrum of techniques including cell culture of human tissues and established cell lines, transplantation models, histology and cancer stem cell biology. The project will be co-supervised by an experienced post-doc at the bench, working in a team atmosphere from the start to optimise and develop the primary culture and lentiviral systems. This study represents a key proof-of-principle translational step towards testing this therapeutic strategy in clinical trials.

How to Apply:
Applications for this PhD studentship can be made through our Online Application Service.
Please ensure you state in the ‘Funding’ section of the application that you intend to apply for this studentship.

Further Official Information and Application Procedure>>

Read More

2 PhD Positions in Software Engineering

Course Level:  PhD
Application Deadline: 1 August 2013.
Type of employment: Fixed-term employment, Four years full-time PhD studies
Extent: 100 %
Location: Department of Computer Science and Engineering, Lindholmen - Göteborg

Eligibility:
 The qualifications for education on a doctoral level are: degree at M.Sc. level, at least 240  university points, of which 60 are on an advanced level, or in an other way acquired similar knowledge.

Applicants shall have a Master's Degree or corresponding in Computer Science, Software Engineering, or in a related discipline. As for all PhD studies, a genuine interest and curiosity in the subject matter, excellent analytical and communication skills, orally as well as written, ability to work independently and intrinsic motivation are needed. Proven proficiency in English (orally and literally) is required.

Job assignments

Job Description for PhD Student Position 1:

This project aims to develop techniques for automatically updating UML models based on progressing source code.A typical situation in software development projects is that a UML design of the systems is made in the early phase of the project. Once the project moves into later phases, emphasis of the developers shifts from designing to the source code. Changes are then only applied to the source code and the UML model becomes increasingly outdated. However, there are several occasions when an up-to-date model is valuable: for maintenance engineers, for testers and for engineerings joining a project at a later stage. The approach: a test set of UML models and source code is available.The project consists of: (1) Developing techniques for selecting which parts of the changes to the source code should be used to update the UML model. These may be statistics-based learning techniques, summarization techniques, feature-identification or other problem-specific approaches. (2) Implementing tooling to show and validate the approach, ideally working with industrial case studies.

Job Description for PhD Student Position 2:

This project aims to develop a new approach for software composition. The novelty of this composition model is that it is aims to separate concerns related to technical composition, functionality (semantics) and interaction style in different interfaces. The feasibility of this approach will be demonstrated by developing a component model that will enable user-driven composition of webpages (somewhat similar to internet mash-ups).

For both positions

The majority of the PhD students' working time is devoted to own research studies. A PhD student is also expected to develop own ideas and communicate scientific results orally as well as in written form. In addition, the positions will normally include 20 percent departmental work, mostly teaching duties. Staying abroad for a 3-6 month visit at a collaborating foreign University is possible. The employments are limited to a maximum of five years.
 Assessment

For position 1:

Experience in model-driven software engineering (in particular XMI) and implementation skills are beneficial.
Professional experience is an additional bonus.

For position 2:

The candidate must be both strong conceptual thinker and have excellent implementation skills, knowledge about component models and software composition is an advantage. The candidate must have demonstrable experience with implementing systems using internet technologies and must have experience with formal methods (preferably in some variant of process algebra).

For both positions:

You may apply even though you have not yet completed your degree yet, but expect to do so before the position starts. Knowledge of Swedish is not a prerequisite for applying because English is the working language for research, and we publish internationally. Both Swedish and English are used in undergraduate courses. Our researchers and PhD students at the department come from more than 30 different countries.

We follow an equal opportunities policy and will in particular encourage female applicants.

Additional information

Following documents should be included in the applications:

-CV
-attested copies of education certificates, including grade reports and other documents, English language test, e.g. TOEFL score
-letters of recommendation from academic institutions and/or previous employers
-details of your specific qualifications for the the position
-list of publications
--relevant work such as bachelor's or master's thesis (or outline of a thesis under preparation).

For more information visit the university website by clicking the link below:

University Website>>>

Read More

PhD Position in Molecular Cell Biology

Course Level:  PhD

Application Deadline: 1 July 2013.

Eligibility:
 Master’s degree in Biochemistry, Cell biology, or Medical biology (or equivalent).
 Excellent communication skills.
 Highly motivated to conduct fundamental scientific research in a team of enthusiastic scientists.
 Experience with fluorescence microscopy or protein engineering is a plus.

Scholarship provider:
        Faculty of Science – Swammerdam Institute for Life Sciences
        University of Amsterdam.

Appointment:

The appointment will be on a temporary basis for a period of 4 years (initial appointment will be for a period of 18 months and after satisfactory evaluation it can be extended for a total duration of 4 years) and should lead to a dissertation (PhD thesis).
An educational plan will be drafted that includes attendance of courses and (international) meetings.

The PhD student is also expected to assist in teaching of undergraduates.


For more information about the project and application Procedure visit:

http://www.uva.nl/en/about-the-uva/working-at-the-uva/vacancies/item/13-186.html

Read More

PhD Position in Software Reliability Lab

Course Level: PhD

Research Area: Program Analysis (Dynamic, Static)

Eligibility:
     Candidates must have B.Sc or M.Sc degree in related fields.
     Strong commitment to research.
     Interest in working at the intersection of theory and practice.

Scholarship Description:
 Full scholarships are available for outstanding B.Sc. students interested in the PhD.
A PhD/post-doc position is a regular job with attractive salary and social benefits.

Interested candidates should send a CV to Prof. Dr. Martin Vechev.
For more information Visit: http://www.srl.inf.ethz.ch/recruiting.php

Read More

M.Sc, PhD and Post-Doc. Opportunities in Cyber Security

Course Level:  Masters , PhD and Post Doctorate

Area of Study:  Computer Security and Privacy

                         Trustworthy Power Grid Cyber-Physical Systems

                         Cloud Computing and Smartphone Security

                         Intrusion Detection and Response

                         Intrusion Forensics and Real-time Root-Cause Analysis

Scholarship Provider : ECE Dept./4N6 Laboratory, University of Miami, United States.

Read More

UK: PhD in Computer Networks

Course Level: PhD

Study Area:  Computer Networks

Scholarship Provider : School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh,United Kingdom.

Application Deadline: 30 August 2013

Eligibility:

• Minimum BS degree with strong background in computer science (or equivalent), particularly in computer networks.
• EU/UK student who can start at least in September.
•  For international students, they must have legally stayed in the UK or other EU countries at least for three years on the first day of their study.
•  Non-UK students may required to prove their ability in English by showing IELTS or TOEFL score e.g. IELTS: overall 6.5 or above ,each section: at least 6.0.

Read More