[TYPES/announce] PhD Position in Formal Methods for Biology at DTU Technical University of Denmark

[Andrea Vandin]

The section for Formal Methods of DTU Compute offers a 3-years PhD position
starting in late 2019 or early 2020. The position is funded by the
Independent Research Fund of Denmark through the project ‘REDUCTO: A novel
approach for the reduction of Boolean networks’. The PI of the project is
the Associate Professor Andrea Vandin in collaboration with Luca Cardelli
(University of Oxford, UK), Claudine Chaouiya (I2M, Aix Marseille Univ,
CNRS, Centrale Marseille, Marseille, France & Instituto Gulbenkian de
Ciência, Portugal), and Lars Keld Nielsen (Novo Nordisk Foundation Center
for Biosustainability, Denmark). Funds are allocated for research visits to
the project collaborators. The PhD student will be co-supervised by Andrea
Vandin and the Head of Section Alberto Lluch Lafuente.



*Project Description*

Boolean networks (BN) are a graph-based well-established method to model
biological systems. In order to accurately model systems, we often face
models too complex to be interpreted or analyzed. Several reduction
techniques exist to mitigate this problem. Our crucial hypothesis is that
novel approaches to the reduction of BNs are needed, and that those can be
developed by using a theoretical computer science approach. The project
aims at developing novel mathematically-grounded techniques and tools to
reduce and simplify complex BNs. The starting point will be recent work of
the PI, presented e.g. in:

   - Maximal aggregation of polynomial dynamical systems, L Cardelli, M
   Tribastone, M Tschaikowski, A Vandin, Proceedings of the National Academy
   of Sciences 114 (38), 10029-10034,
   https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1702697114
   - Symbolic computation of differential equivalences, L Cardelli, M
   Tribastone, M Tschaikowski, A Vandin, Proceedings of POPL 2016,
   https://doi.org/10.1145/2837614.2837649

Tool support will be based on the tool ERODE (http://bit.ly/ERODE),
maintained by the PI.


*Requirements*

Candidates must have (or be close to complete) a master degree in computer
science and engineering, applied mathematics, or similar academic
qualifications. Preference will be given to candidates with documented
experience in formal methods, while interest in biological topics will be
positively considered. Good command of the English language is essential.



*We offer*

We offer an interesting and challenging job in an international
environment. DTU is a leading technical university in northern Europe which
benchmarks with the best universities in the world. Salary is competitive
(roughly in the order of 2400 EUR net per month). This is a 3 years
full-time position.



*Expression of Interest*

Interested candidates should contact Andrea Vandin (
http://people.compute.dtu.dk/anvan/) at anvan at dtu.dk.

-- 
Andrea Vandin, PhD
Associate Professor

DTU - Technical University of Denmark,
Department of Applied Mathematics and Computer Science,
Section on Formal Methods
http://www.compute.dtu.dk/english/research/formalmethods

URL: http://people.compute.dtu.dk/anvan/
e-mail: anvan at dtu.dk
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