[TYPES/announce] PhD position on "Semantics and Verification of Accelerator Programming"

[Marieke Huisman]

[[Apologies for multiple copies]]

PhD position for four years on "Semantics and Verification of 
Accelerator Programming" in the Formal Methods and Tools group, 
University of Twente, Netherlands
Deadline for application: 1st of May
More information and applications via: http://utwente.nl/vacatures/

The research group Formal Methods and Tools at the University of
Twente (Enschede, The Netherlands) is looking for

*a PhD researcher (4 years) *

to work on the EU Strep project CARP (Correct and Efficient Accelerator 
Programming), funded by the European Union.

Within the context of the CARP project, you will collaborate with the 
other partners in the project: Imperial College, UK; Realeyes, Estonia; 
ARM, UK; RTWH Aachen, Germany, Monoidics, UK, ENS, France and Rightware, 
Finland.

*
**The CARP Project:*

In recent years, massively parallel accelerator processors, primarily 
GPUs, have become widely available to end-users. Accelerators offer 
tremendous compute power at a low cost, and tasks such as media 
processing, simulation, medical imaging and eye-tracking can be 
accelerated to beat CPU performance by orders of magnitude. Performance 
is gained in energy efficiency and execution speed, allowing intensive 
media processing software to run in low-power consumer devices.

Accelerators present a serious challenge for software developers. A 
system may contain one or more of the plethora of accelerators on the 
market, with many more products anticipated in the immediate future. 
Applications must exhibit portable correctness, operating correctly on 
any configuration of accelerators, and portable performance, exploiting 
processing power and energy efficiency offered by a wide range of devices.

The overall aims of CARP are to design techniques and tools for correct 
and efficient accelerator programming:
- Novel & attractive methods for constructing system-independent 
accelerator programs
- Advanced code generation techniques to produce highly optimised 
system-specific code from system-independent programs
- Scalable static techniques for analysing system-independent and 
system-specific accelerator programs, both qualitatively and quantitatively

*This Project: *

The PhD candidate we are looking for is expected to work on the 
development of tools and techniques for correct accelerator programming. 
We have developed a verification technique for low-level GPU programming 
(for OpenCL), ba, and want to extend this to verify also the functional 
behaviour of applications. Moreover, the verifications should be done 
automatically, which requires the development of dedicated verification 
algorithms. Within the consortium an intermediate programming language 
for accelerator programming is developed. In this programming language, 
the developer can give compiler hints on where to parallellise. The PhD 
candidate is expected to develop automatic verification techniques to 
check whether the compiler hints are indeed applicable, or if they could 
lead to errors in the code.


*We seek:*

An enthusiastic PhD student with an MSc degree in Computer Science (or 
an equivalent qualification). The candidate should have a thorough 
theoretical background, a demonstrable interest in program semantics and 
verification, and some knowledge about multithreaded programming (in 
Java/C/C++).

We are looking for a researcher with an independent mind who is willing 
to cooperate in our team. It is understood that he or she works on the 
topics listed above, and contributes to the expected deliverables for 
the project.  Further we ask for good communicative and good 
collaboration skills. Candidates should be prepared to prove their 
English language skills.

As a research outcome we expect publications, (prototype) tools, and a 
PhD thesis.

Starting date of the position: June 1st, 2013, or as soon as possible 
thereafter.


*We offer:*

- A PhD position for four years (38 hrs/week)
- A stimulating scientific environment
- Gross salary ranging from EUR 2042 tot E 2612 (4th yr) per month
- Holiday allowance (8%), end-of-year bonus (8.3%)
- Good secondary conditions, in accordance with the collective labour 
agreement CAO-NU for Dutch universities
- A green Campus with lots of sports facilities

You will be a member of the Twente Graduate School in the research 
programme 'Dependable and Secure Computing' under the leadership of Prof 
Dr Jaco van de Pol. The research programme offers advanced courses to 
deepen your scientific knowledge in preparation to your future career 
(within or outside academia). We provide our PhD students with excellent 
opportunities to broaden their personal knowledge and to professionalise 
their academic skills. Participation in national and/or international 
summer schools and workshops, and visits to other prestigious research 
institutes and universities can be part of this programme.

*Further information:*

- FMT group: http://fmt.cs.utwente.nl/
- Dr. Marieke Huisman (Marieke.Huisman at ewi.utwente.nl)
- The CARP project: http://fmt.ewi.utwente.nl/files/projects/CARP.d1.pdf

*Application: *

Please submit your application before 1st of May, 2013 via 
http://www.utwente.nl/vacatures/en/.  We strongly encourage interested 
applicants to send in their applications as soon as possible.

Your application should consist of:

- a cover letter (explain your specific interest and qualifications);
- a full Curriculum Vitae, including a list of all courses + marks, and 
a short description of your MSc thesis; and
- references (contact information) of two scientific staff members.
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