Connectionists: three-year postdoctoral position in biorobotics - RobotiCSS Lab (Milano-Bicocca), BioRob Lab (EPFL)

[Edoardo Datteri]

[image: logo_RiLS.png]

*Call for Expressions of Interest: Three-year postdoctoral position in
biorobotics co-supervised by the RobotiCSS Lab at the University of
Milano-Bicocca (Edoardo Datteri) and the Biorobotics Laboratory at the EPFL
(Auke Ijspeert).*

The RiLS (Robots in the Life Sciences)
<https://roboticss.formazione.unimib.it/research-2/funded-research-projects/rils/>
project, led by Edoardo Datteri
<https://roboticss.formazione.unimib.it/edoardo-datteri/> at the RobotiCSS
lab <https://roboticss.formazione.unimib.it/>, aims to investigate the role
of robots as tools for studying animal cognition and behavior. To this end,
the lab is creating interdisciplinary research groups composed of
scientists and philosophers of science. We are looking for a three-year
postdoctoral researcher to carry out biorobotic studies on animal
navigation and locomotion (see the specifications below). This research
will be conducted at the RobotiCSS Lab (Milan, Italy), and the researcher
will be co-supervised by Prof. Edoardo Datteri (RobotiCSS Lab,
https://roboticss.formazione.unimib.it/) and Prof. Auke Ijspeert
<https://www.epfl.ch/labs/biorob/people/ijspeert/> of the BioRob Lab at EPFL
<https://www.epfl.ch/labs/biorob/> (Lausanne, Switzerland,
https://www.epfl.ch/labs/biorob/).

The call for applications will formally open in December 2026. *The
position will start in March-April 2027, with a gross annual salary of
€37,000 *before taxes, including social security and pension contributions.

Description of the RiLS project:
https://roboticss.formazione.unimib.it/research-2/funded-research-projects/rils/


*If you are interested in this position, please contact Edoardo Datteri at
edoardo.datteri at unimib.it <edoardo.datteri at unimib.it>*
*Background:*
The exact topic of research is still open. Broadly, we are interested in
using robots and numerical simulation to investigate principles of animal
locomotion and navigation, with a particular focus on vertebrate animals,
from fish to humans. The project could for instance investigate how higher
centers (e.g. the motor cortex), the spinal cord and the musculoskeletal
system interact to generate the robust and agile locomotion observed in
animals. There are still many open questions in neuroscience about the
relative importance of feedforward and feedback control, and how higher
control centers can learn and plan movements while taking into account
computations performed at the spinal cord level. The exact roles of the
embodiment and environment also remains to be investigated.


*Requirements:*The goal would be to hire a researcher with a background in
robotics (ideally with expertise in the control of animal-like or humanoid
robots) and/or computational neuroscience. The ideal candidates should also
have strong backgrounds in math and programming, and an interest in
interdisciplinary research.


-- 

Edoardo Datteri
Full professor of Logic and Philosophy of Science
President of the AISC - Italian Association for the Cognitive Sciences
Coordinator of the RobotiCSS Lab - Laboratory of Robotics for the
Cognitive and Social Sciences
<https://roboticss.formazione.unimib.it/>

Latest representative publications:


   - Datteri, E. (2025). Models for Surrogative Stimulation.
*Erkenntnis*. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10670-025-00951-7
   - Datteri, E. (2025). Folk-Ontological Stances Towards Robots and
Psychological Human Likeness. *International Journal of Social
Robotics*, 17(2), 257–276. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12369-025-01225-6
   - Roselli, C., Lapomarda, L., & Datteri, E. (2025). How culture
modulates anthropomorphism in Human-Robot Interaction: A review. *Acta
Psychologica*, *255*, 104871.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.actpsy.2025.104871

See also https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=eGzrD6gAAAAJ&hl=ithttps://www.researchgate.net/profile/Edoardo-Datteri?ev=hdr_xprf

Department of Human Sciences for Education "R. Massa", University of
Milano-Bicocca
Building U6, Piazza dell'Ateneo Nuovo 1, 20126 Milan

Vice-coordinator of the Master Degree in Education, Univ. of Milano-Bicocca

Senior Editor of BMC Psychology

Webex Personal Room: https://unimib.webex.com/meet/edoardo.datteri

I dati personali saranno trattati ai sensi del Decreto Legislativo
n. 196 del 2003 (Codice in materia di protezione dei dati personali)
e sue successive modifiche e integrazioni, nonché del Regolamento UE
2016/679 (GDPR).
È possibile prendere visione della informativa al seguente link:
https://www.unimib.it/servizi/segreterie/informativa-privacy
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mailman.srv.cs.cmu.edu/pipermail/connectionists/attachments/20260706/70e088d6/attachment.html>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: logo_RiLS.png
Type: image/png
Size: 62258 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://mailman.srv.cs.cmu.edu/pipermail/connectionists/attachments/20260706/70e088d6/attachment.png>