Connectionists: JOB: IDIAP/EPFL (CH) - PhD positions in Machine Learning & Vision and for Human-Robot

[Jean-Marc Odobez]

The Idiap Research Institute (www.idiap.ch), a laboratory associated 
with  EPFL  (Swiss Federal  Institute  of  Technology, Lausanne, 
www.epfl.ch) seeks qualified candidates in computer vision and machine 
learning for multi-modal interaction modeling.

Context:
The research will be conducted in the context of MuMMER (MultiModal Mall 
Entertainment Robot), a 4-year EU Horizon 2020 funded project involving 
several leading European institutions in the field. The project will 
develop a humanoid robot (based on Aldebaran's Pepper platform) able to 
engage and interact autonomously and naturally with individuals or 
groups or people. To support this behaviour, the project consortium will 
develop and integrate new methods from audiovisual scene processing, 
social-signal processing, high-level action selection, and human-aware 
robot navigation. See
http://www.mummer-project.eu/


PhD  position and requirements:

The research conducted at Idiap will focus on the sensing part, but with 
an HRI flavor, like better accounting for robot gestures, active sensing 
to reduce perception uncertainties or exploiting soft priors coming from 
communication and dialog models, etc. Within a team of two to three PhD 
students/postdocs, the PhD student is expected to advance the 
state-of-the-art in this field. The work will be oriented towards 
vision/depth processing, and the modeling of upper-body and face 
representation for the design of head detectors/trackers, landmark or 
eye alignements, or non-verbal behavior extraction methods appropriate 
at different depth ranges like for gaze (see for instance prior work in 
http://www.idiap.ch/project/g3e/).

These work will rely on previous experience ans software developed in 
the context of previous projects.

The ideal Ph.D student should have a master in computer science, 
engineering, or applied mathematics. S/he should have a good background 
in mathematics, statistics, and programming (C/C++, Python). Prior 
experience or background in statistical learning theory, computer vision 
or robotics will be a plus.

The successful PhD candidate will become a doctoral student at EPFL 
(http://www.epfl.ch) provided that s/he is accepted by the Doctoral 
School at EPFL (http://phd.epfl.ch/applicants). Appointment for the PhD 
position is for a maximum of 4 years. Annual gross salary ranges from 
48,000 CHF (first year) to 52,000 CHF (last year). The starting date is 
as early as possible.

Application:

For more information, please contact Dr Jean-Marc Odobez 
(odobez at idiap.ch, www.idiap.ch/~odobez). Interested candidates should 
submit a cover letter, a detailed CV, and the names of three references 
(or recommendation letters).

About IDIAP:
------------
Idiap is an independent, non-profit research institute recognized and 
supported by the Swiss Government, and affiliated with the Ecole 
Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL). It is located in the town of 
Martigny in Valais, a scenic region in the south of Switzerland, 
surrounded by the highest mountains of Europe, and offering exciting 
recreational activities, including hiking, climbing and skiing, as well 
as varied cultural activities. It is within close proximity to Geneva 
and Lausanne. Although Idiap is located in the French part of 
Switzerland, English is the working language. Free French lessons are 
provided.

Idiap offers competitive salaries and conditions at all levels in a 
young, dynamic, and multicultural environment. Idiap is an equal 
opportunity employer and is actively involved in the "Advancement of 
Women in Science" European initiative.

-- 
Jean-Marc Odobez,
IDIAP & EPFL Senior Researcher  (EPFL MER)
IDIAP Research Institute (http://www.idiap.ch)
Tel: +41 (0)27 721 77 26
Web: http://www.idiap.ch/~odobez