Pro²Future – Cognitive and Sustainable Products and Production Systems of the Future – is an industry-oriented COMET K1 research center in the field of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and cognitive/industrial ICT, Human-Machine Interaction (HMI), and data-driven process optimization, with a focus on cognitive and sustainable products and production systems. These are supported by the areas of Perception, Orchestration, and Analytics. Further fields of activity at the center include mechatronic systems, embedded systems, pervasive computing systems, and big data analytics.
PhD Position (Doctoral Researcher) in Cognitive Production Systems (m/f/d)
Full-time (38.5 hrs/week) or part-time | Location: Graz | PhD entry after Master’s degree
To strengthen our team in the field of Cognitive Production Systems, we are looking for a dedicated individual to conduct doctoral (PhD) research on practice-oriented AI topics.
Your Research Focus in an Industrial Environment
In the Cognitive Production Systems research area, you will develop innovative AI methods for industrial and robotic applications. The focus is on anomaly detection and the prediction of machine behavior based on sensor data.
With your research, you will make a direct contribution to preventing failures, increasing equipment availability, and improving process efficiency in industry. The methods you develop will help detect critical faults at an early stage and enable well-founded decisions in complex environments.
The goal of the research is to monitor machine sensor data during ongoing operation and analyze it using AI. Due to the specific nature of the data, standard architectures and classical supervised learning approaches are not sufficient.
As part of the project, you will work with modern methods from the following areas:
- Unsupervised Machine Learning
- Embedding space architectures (auto-encoder, variational and vector-quantized autoencoder)
- World model concepts (JEPA/SigReg)
- Specific concepts for classification and prediction (such as contrastive learning, masked time series modeling)
- Specific methods for quality assurance of AI systems (such as GradCam, PaCMAP)
The PhD project is carried out in close collaboration with experienced researchers, industry partners, and university supervision.
What Awaits You With Us
- A fully funded PhD position with a clearly defined scientific objective.
- Structured onboarding and intensive technical supervision.
- Involvement in application-oriented research projects.
- Opportunities for scientific publications & conference participation.
- A young, collegial, and appreciative working environment.
- Flexible working hours and flat hierarchies.
What You Should Bring
- A completed, or nearly completed, Master’s degree in mechatronics, electrical engineering, digital engineering, mechanical engineering, or a related technical field.
- Experience with industrial control systems (e.g., Beckhoff TwinCAT) or robotics applications (ROS2) is an advantage.
- Practical knowledge of working with high-frequency sensor data streams (e.g., accelerometers/vibration sensors, power/current transducers) and basic signal processing methods (FFT, filtering) is desirable.
- Programming skills in Python using numerical and scientific libraries (e.g., NumPy, SciPy, Pandas) for automated data extraction and analysis are an advantage.
- Motivation to continuously develop your expertise and independently work your way into new topics.
- Ability to work in a team and a structured way of working.
- Good German and good English skills.
If German is not (yet) your working language, we expect strong motivation to quickly learn German and actively apply it in everyday work.
What Our Working Environment and Framework Conditions Offer
- Full-time or part-time possible (by arrangement).
- Excellent compatibility of research, studies, and private life thanks to flexible working hours and the option to work from home.
- Strong integration into the Austrian research and university landscape.
- Active promotion of women in research.
- Respect, diversity, and equal opportunity as lived values.
- For this position, we offer a starting gross annual salary of EUR 53,500 (full-time basis).
Interested?
Apply at with your CV, cover letter, and proof of enrollment/degree. Only complete applications can be considered.
Contact: Christina Pichler | Tel. +43 664 888 78 903