Our society is changing. Artificial Intelligence (AI) and related technologies are playing an increasingly important role in our society. To this end Leiden University has started a new, university wide initiative to enable collaboration on the use of AI. By building on and expanding the already existing expertise of AI the project intends to advance science and improve the quality of our life. All the disciplines of the University of Leiden are involved: Archeology, Humanities, Social Sciences, Law, Public Administration, Sciences, and also the Leiden University Medical Centre (LUMC), to collaborate and appoint new staff with joint interests. Leiden University has earmarked dedicated funding for the appointment of full professors, assistant professors, a post-doc and support staff to facilitate the expansion of AI related research at all its departments.

Key responsibilities
The successful candidate will develop general theories of data and machine learning techniques to analyse data, in particular for complex data for prediction and classification in the social and behavioural sciences. The successful candidate will make the new techniques available through algorithms and implement these in publicly accessible software (e.g. SPSS, R or Python). 

Visualisation will be an essential ingredient of the new techniques. Typical important research topics are: 

• Description of relationships in high-dimensional data using distances and geometry;
• Dimension reduction based on geometry;
• Development of advanced machine learning methods;
• Optimal transformation of data;
• Optimization by minimizing loss functions through dedicated algorithms;
• Statistical methods for stability, generalization and model selection;
• Efficient algorithms for distance driven methods for prediction and classification.

The appointment will be both at the Mathematical Institute, Faculty of Sciences, and at the Section Methodology and Statistics, Institute of Psychology, Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences (50 % each).

See full profile: https://www.universiteitleiden.nl/binaries/content/assets/werken-bij/bijlage-vac-19-363-artificial-intelligence-and-data-theory.pdf

We offer a full-time temporary appointment for a period of 5 years with a view to a permanent contract depending on good performance and funding.  Salary range from € 5.582,- to € 8.127,- gross per month (pay scale H2 in accordance with the Collective Labour Agreement for Dutch Universities).

Leiden University offers an attractive benefits package with additional holiday (8%) and end-of-year (8.3 %) bonuses, training, career development and sabbatical leave. Our individual choices model gives you some freedom to assemble your own set of terms and conditions. For international spouses we have set up a dual career programme. Candidates from outside the Netherlands may be eligible for a substantial tax break. For more information, see http://workingat.leiden.edu/

Leiden University requires teaching staff to obtain the University Teaching Qualification (UTQ). If the successful applicant does not already possess this qualification or its equivalent, he/she must be willing to obtain this Qualification within two years.

We offer a full-time temporary appointment for a period of 5 years with a view to a permanent contract depending on good performance and funding.  Salary range from € 5.582,- to € 8.127,- gross per month (pay scale H2 in accordance with the Collective Labour Agreement for Dutch Universities).

Leiden University offers an attractive benefits package with additional holiday (8%) and end-of-year (8.3 %) bonuses, training, career development and sabbatical leave. Our individual choices model gives you some freedom to assemble your own set of terms and conditions. For international spouses we have set up a dual career programme. Candidates from outside the Netherlands may be eligible for a substantial tax break. For more information, see http://workingat.leiden.edu/

Leiden University requires teaching staff to obtain the University Teaching Qualification (UTQ). If the successful applicant does not already possess this qualification or its equivalent, he/she must be willing to obtain this Qualification within two years.

Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences / Institute of Psychology
The Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences comprises four institutes: Education and Child Studies, Political Science, Psychology and Cultural Anthropology & Development Sociology. The Faculty also includes the Centre for Science and Technology Studies and hosts 5,000 students and 600 staff members.

The Institute of Psychology comprises six units (teaching + research): Health, Medical and Neuropsychology, Clinical Psychology, Cognitive Psychology, Developmental and Educational Psychology, Social and Organizational Psychology, and Methodology and Statistics. The Institute of Psychology offers a stimulating environment that promotes collaboration within and between units. For more information, see http://www.fsw.leidenuniv.nl/psychologie/.

Mathematical Institute
The institute has a strong international orientation. Its mission is to perform high quality research at the frontiers of mathematical knowledge, and to educate future generations of mathematicians and statisticians in a friendly but challenging environment.

The expertise of the members of the institute covers a broad range of topics, with a focus on Algebra, Geometry and Number Theory; Analysis and Dynamical Systems; Probability Theory; and Statistics. Research is focused both on fundamental mathematics and statistics and on applications in other sciences, society and industry.