Research Fellow in Decision Making

Organisation

Cranfield University

School/Department

School of Aerospace, Transport and Manufacturing

Based at

Cranfield Campus, Cranfield, Bedfordshire

Hours of work

37 hours per week, normally worked Monday to Friday. Flexible working will be considered

Contract type

Fixed term contract

Fixed Term Period

24 months

Salary

Full time starting salary is normally in the range of £35,559 to £39,434 per annum pro rata, (37 hours per week)

About the Role

In this role you will develop decision-making, especially task allocation, solutions to enable UAS to operate autonomously in a mixed traffic environment and in the vicinity of manned aircraft within a controlled airspace. For the development, this role will require you to define performance metrics and requirements, design a decision-making model, e.g., a model based on Markov Decision Process (MDP), develop decision-making algorithm, analyse the algorithm developed against the metrics and requirements defined, and perform the validation.

The successful candidate will be expected to achieve milestones and deliverables of the project and deliver high quality publications and knowledge dissemination via effective written and oral communication skills. You will work closely with members of the project consortium including academic and industrial partners and all research teams of the Centre, the Aerospace Integration Research Centre and Digital Aviation Research and Technology Centre.

About You

You will have knowledge and substantial understanding of one or more of the following areas:

• Decision making models, e.g., MDP models
• Decision-making, especially task allocation, algorithms
• Machine learning/AI/RL

You will hold a PhD level degree (or close to completion) in Aerospace Engineering, Computer Science, or related fields (& ideally Control or Electronic Engineering). This role would suit an individual with excellent communication skills, high degree of personal motivation, and the ability to work independently. Additionally, you will have programming knowledge on MATLAB, C/C++, or Python.

Your previous experience in developing aerospace systems will be critical in this role where you will need to be able to define performance metrics and requirements, design a decision-making model, e.g., a model based on Markov Decision Process (MDP), develop decision-making algorithms, analyse the algorithms developed against the metrics and requirements defined, and perform the validation.

About Us

As a specialist postgraduate university, Cranfield’s world-class expertise, large-scale facilities and unrivalled industry partnerships are creating leaders in technology and management globally. Learn more about Cranfield and our unique impact here .

Aerospace is at the heart of Cranfield’s global research airport and is renowned throughout the world for its teaching and research in the fields of aviation and aerospace.  Cranfield Aerospace’s six centres are the powerhouses of our world class research, driving technological and conceptual advances in aeronautics, propulsion engineering, cyber-physical systems and intelligent automation. Through the strong links with industry built over the past 70 years, we focus on defining and delivering the aircraft, airport and airspace management of the future and are the only university in Europe with our own airport and runway.  Cranfield Aerospace is internationally recognised as the first choice for research and education in all aspects of aerospace including aircraft, drones, urban air mobility and space.  Find out more about our work here About Aerospace .

Our Values and Commitments

Our shared, stated values help to define who we are and underpin everything we do: Ambition; Impact; Respect; and Community. Find out more here .

We aim to create and maintain a culture in which everyone can work and study together and realise their full potential. We are a Disability Confident Employer and proud members of the Stonewall Diversity Champions Programme. We are also committed to actively exploring flexible working options for each role.  Our equal opportunities and diversity monitoring has shown that women are currently underrepresented within the university and so we actively encourage applications from eligible female candidates.  To further demonstrate our commitment to progressing gender diversity in STEM, we hold an Institutional Athena SWAN Bronze award, are members of Working Families; sponsors of International Women in Engineering Day and signatories of the Women in Defence and Women in Aerospace and Aviation Charters.  Find out more about our key commitments to Equality, Diversity and Inclusion and Flexible Working here .

Working Arrangements

Collaborating and connecting are integral to so much of what we do. Our Working Arrangements Framework provides many staff with the opportunity to flexibly combine on-site and remote working, where job roles allow, balancing the needs of our community of staff, students, clients and partners.

For an informal discussion, please contact Hyo-Sang Shin, Professor of Guidance, Navigation and Control on (T); +44 (0)1234 758577 or +44 (0)1234 750111 Ext. 8577 or (E); [email protected]