The Advanced Network Management and Control laboratory at Electrical Engineering (EE) department of TU/e has one Ph.D. position in the field of wireless communications, distributed computing and distributed AI.

Goal and background

Isolated edge networks, like orbiting satellite swarms or sensing swarms in earth cavities, are large scale ultra dense wireless sensor deployments which open new fields for distributed AI. Novel AI mechanisms need to simultaneously execute processing and communication at the wireless edge meshes. They are expected to reduce the large data volumes to be either stored or transmitted to more centralized points.

TU/e is leading a Dutch consortium, Autonomous Distribution Architecture on Progressing Topologies and Optimization of Resources (ADAPTOR), which investigates novel ways to use non-linearities in wireless medium, tranceivers and transmissions to simultaneously enable communication and computation. The project was funded by the Dutch Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO) and Thermo Fisher Scientific in cooperation with ASTRON.

ADAPTOR aims, besides others, at providing intelligent computing and communication strategies locally at micro-satellite swarms to minimize the data volumes to be transferred to Earth. Several maintenance and functional services need to be computed completing at runtime a multitude of non-linear approximations. Yet, the scarcity of resources (compute, storage and communication) at those distributed instruments require novel computing approaches. 

Research Challenges

TU/e envisions low-power wireless meshes as swarms of computing and communication units able to approximate several non-linear functions collectively and simultaneously. Instead of packing more capacity per device or link, we will study novel AI paradigms which simultaneously harvest both the complexity of neural networks and their environment they operate in. This allows transforming input data to a hyper dimensional space at a lower power consumption.

Role

The candidate will analytically and experimentally study the transformative power of the wireless transmissions and channel conditions on wirelessly distributed neural networks. Should this be well understood, the next step is to devise ways to use and control this power to improve the processing capabilities of wireless meshes. This work sits at the intersection of wireless communications and artificial intelligence involving embedded systems, signal processing, advanced networking, recurrent and spiking neural networks.

Work environment

Eindhoven University of Technology (TU/e) is one of Europe's top technological universities, in the heart of one of Europe's largest high-tech innovation ecosystems - the Eindhoven Brainport region. Research at TU/e is a combination of academic excellence and a strong real-world impact through close collaboration with regional and international high-tech industries.

The candidate will be employed within the Electro-Optical Communications Group (ECO), in particular within the advanced networking laboratory. The candidate will strongly interact with the ECO group, which consists of over 70 researchers. This position is embedded within the Center for Wireless Technology (CWT/e) at TU/e which focuses on four programs: Ultra-High Data-Rate Systems, Ultra-Low Power and Internet-of-Things Communication, Terahertz Technology, and Radio Astronomy.

We are looking, therefore, for one strong Ph.D. researcher to:
Collaboration - Continuously interact with other ECO researchers and with ADAPTOR's partners and other users.
Dissemination - Contribute to the project reporting, scientific publications and other activities related to the preparation of new grant proposals to national and European projects.

The Ph.D. researcher should demonstrate:

• Self-drive, proactivity, curiosity and execution power.
• Creativity and critical thinking and an ability to cooperate with internal and external partners.
• Master of Science degree in Computer Science or Electrical Engineering with excellent grades in related courses.
• Deep understanding in wired/wireless communications and network implementations.
• Strong theoretical and practical knowledge and experience with artificial intelligence techniques, esp. recurrent neural networks and reinforcement learning.
• Interest in combining theory and experiments and well-developed analytic skills.
• Excellent communication skills.
• Excellent proficiency (written and verbal) in English.

• A meaningful job in a dynamic and ambitious university with the possibility to present your work at international conferences.
• A full-time employment for four years, with an intermediate evaluation after one year.
• To support you during your PhD and to prepare you for the rest of your career, you will have free access to a personal development program for PhD students (PROOF program).
• A gross monthly salary and benefits in accordance with the Collective Labor Agreement of the Dutch Universities.
• Benefits in accordance with the Collective Labor Agreement for Dutch Universities.
• Additionally, an annual holiday allowance of 8% of the yearly salary, plus a year-end allowance of 8.3% of the annual salary.
• A broad package of fringe benefits, including an excellent technical infrastructure, moving expenses, and savings schemes.
• Should you come from abroad and comply with certain conditions, you can make use of the so-called '30% facility', which permits you not to pay tax on 30% of your salary.
• Family-friendly initiatives are in place, such as an international spouse program, and excellent on-campus children day care and sports facilities.