项目介绍

2024年1月4日

Job description

Do you have a strong technical background in information systems and AI and do you want to address a key societal challenge? Then join iBeChange, a European research project that aims to develop a novel platform to empower individuals to adopt lifestyle habits that can reduce the risk of developing cancer by means of personalized recommendations. Cancer is a leading cause of death in the world, according to the World Health Organization estimates (2021), since nearly 10 million people died of cancer in 20201. Research has shown that certain risk factors increase a person’s chances of developing a variety of cancers, including the most diagnosed (i.e., lung, colorectal, prostate, and breast cancer). Such risk factors include those that cannot be controlled (e.g., age or family history), as well as those that could be modified, such as health behaviours and exposures to known environmental carcinogens. Prevention of cancer and other chronic diseases by improving people’s health through modifiable risk behaviours is a cornerstone of public health with high socioeconomic implications.

Your PhD focus will be technically oriented, focusing on developing novel techniques to support digital health interventions. We aim to use wearable trackers and AI in the context of digital twin-based personalization. Your PhD project will specifically focus on developing a framework to deliver personalized and adaptive recommendations to participants, with the aim of improving their adherence to the intervention. Different participants are likely to have different habits and preferences, for instance, regarding eating and sporting. We expect that taking these aspects into account will be beneficial for providing recommendations tailored to the participants. Personalization will also be explored at the level of preferences for behavior change strategies (e.g., social, competitive, or health education-related), since prior studies have indicated great variability in such preferences. Ensuring high-level of adherence is a crucial requirement for the success of the interventions.

We aim at exploiting state-of-the art AI techniques, such as process mining techniques, to leverage diverse data sources (e.g., wearables, or interactions with the health platform) and deliver interpretable end-to-end participant routine models able to capture the rich personal time related patterns that may help understand barriers or drivers for, e.g., physical activity. We aim at coupling these techniques with advanced decision support techniques, such as deep reinforcement learning, to obtained personalized interventions and to determine the best moment to nudge the participants to achieve high adherence levels.

Such a framework will likely raise challenges on the explainability of the AI, which we consider an opportunity for your PhD research. In particular, we aim at developing novel techniques to address explainability challenges in sequential decision making contexts, with the goal of increase users’ understanding of the reason why certain recommendations are proposed at a given moment. We expect this to be beneficial to gain users’ trust in the system and to enable an active involvement from the user in determining when to accept the proposed recommendation and when exploring possible alternatives.

Job requirements

• A master’s degree (or an equivalent academic degree) in Information Systems, Software Engineering, Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence, or a related discipline.
• A research-oriented attitude (accountable, visionary, ethical, collaborative, curious, …)
• An engineering-oriented attitude (can-do, will-build, has-tested, …)
• Affinity with web development tools (APIs, databases, at least one front-end framework)
• Eagerness to work in an interdisciplinary team and a multi-stakeholder project
• Excellent communications skills
• Good skills for planning, pro-active monitoring and strategic pivoting
• Fluent in spoken and written English (C1 level)
• Professional working proficiency of Dutch is a plus, but can be compensated when excelling technically and collaborating well with the other PhD candidates

Conditions of employment

A meaningful job in a dynamic and ambitious university, in an interdisciplinary setting and within an international network. You will work on a beautiful, green campus within walking distance of the central train station. In addition, we offer you:

• Full-time employment for four years, with an intermediate evaluation (go/no-go) after nine months. You will spend 10% of your employment on teaching tasks.
• Salary and benefits (such as a pension scheme, paid pregnancy and maternity leave, partially paid parental leave) in accordance with the Collective Labour Agreement for Dutch Universities, scale P (min. €2,770 max. €3,539).
• A year-end bonus of 8.3% and annual vacation pay of 8%.
• High-quality training programs and other support to grow into a self-aware, autonomous scientific researcher. At TU/e we challenge you to take charge of your own learning process.
• An excellent technical infrastructure, on-campus children’s day care and sports facilities.
• An allowance for commuting, working from home and internet costs.
• A Staff Immigration Team and a tax compensation scheme (the 30% facility) for international candidates.

Information and application

About us

Eindhoven University of Technology is an internationally top-ranking university in the Netherlands that combines scientific curiosity with a hands-on attitude. Our spirit of collaboration translates into an open culture and a top-five position in collaborating with advanced industries. Fundamental knowledge enables us to design solutions for the highly complex problems of today and tomorrow. 

Curious to hear more about what it’s like as a PhD candidate at TU/e? Please view the video.

More information

Do you recognize yourself in this profile and would you like to know more?
For specific questions about the content of this position, please email the hiring manager Pieter van Gorp, p.m.e.v.gorp[at]tue.nl, with the vacancy title in the subject line.

You are encouraged to explore the research line of your intended promotor and project collaborators via https://research.tue.nl/en/persons/pieter-me-van-gorp/publications/ and https://www.tue.nl/en/research/researchers/laura-genga, 

Visit our website for more information about the application process or the conditions of employment. You can also contact

Are you inspired and would like to know more about working at TU/e? Please visit our career page.

Application

You can respond to this vacancy by clicking on the button “Solliciteer nu / Apply now”. We do not respond to applications that are sent to us in a different way.

You can upload a maximum of 5 documents of up to 10 MB each. Please upload (in pdf format):

• Cover letter (2 page max), which demonstrates (a) a genuine interest in this specific project and its supervision context interest, and (b) an explanation of why you meet the job requirements (see above).
• Detailed Curriculum vitae,
• Copy (or a most recent draft version) of your MSc thesis.
• Transcripts of academic records indicating courses taken, including grades,
• Contact details of two references (e-mail, phone number).