PhD Student
Job descriptionPhD position – Paradigms for POST-digital computing Our team: IDLab is a research group of UGent, as well as a core research group of imec. IDLab mainly performs fundamental and applied research on data science and internet technology, and counts over 300 researchers. The AIRO team of IDlab, active since the beginning of this century, has its roots in artificial neural networks and robotics with a tendency for blue sky approaches. As one of the original groups involved in reservoir computing, AIRO has a historical perspective of what can be achieved by exploiting the natural dynamics of physical systems. This vision has since been applied to “physical reservoir computing”, e.g., by computing with analog (active or passive) photonic devices or with compliant robotic bodies. However, although it holds a lot of promise w.r.t. power- and resource-efficient computing, the concept of reservoir computing by itself is not powerful enough to compete with state-of-the-art non-algorithmic computation for complex tasks. One of the main reasons for this is that there is no systematic design methodology (as in digital computing), nor a solid learning-based approach (as in artificial neural networks). Through our involvement in the POST-DIGITAL (https://postdigital.astonphotonics.uk) Marie Curie European Training Network, we want to develop and explore new innovative concepts of computing that efficiently use the natural dynamics of available computing substrates, while re-using what is useful from the state-of-the-art. The job: You will be enrolled at Ghent University for a PhD in Computer Science Engineering. As PhD student at Ghent university, you will collaborate with enthusiastic colleagues at IDLab-AIRO, photonic reservoir computing specialists from the Ghent Photonics group (team of prof. Peter Bienstman) and our international partners in the POST-DIGITAL project. As an ESR in the POST-DIGITAL network, you will form an active training network with the other ESRs in the project and you are required to spend part of your PhD time with some of our partners abroad. Profile of the candidateEligibility
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Our offer: We offer a fully funded PhD scholarship for a period of 3 years (upon positive progress evaluation), possibly extendable with at most 1 year. The PhD research mainly has fundamental and innovative aspects. You will join a young and enthusiastic team of researchers, post-docs and professors. This PhD position is available immediately. More information on ESR-positions can be found here: https://ec.europa.eu/research/mariecurieactions/sites/mariecurie2/files/msca-itn-fellows-note_en_v2.pdf How to applyApply to prof. dr. ir. Joni Dambre (Joni.Dambre@UGent.be) with extensive motivation letter, scientific resume, diplomas and detailed academic results (courses and grades), English proficiency scores for candidates with degrees outside the EU, relevant publications (if any), and two reference contacts. Incomplete applications will not be considered! For any questions, contact prof. dr. ir. Joni Dambre (Joni.Dambre@UGent.be). After the first screening, suitable candidates will be invited for an interview (also possible via Skype) and may get a skills assignment. This position is open immediately and the contract has to start ideally, on Feb. 1st, 2021 and no later than March 1st, 2021. Candidates who are not yet available (e.g., because they haven’t graduated yet) will not be considered! Because we have not much time to find someone, we will use a 2 step procedure:
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