PhD students in WDAqua will spend 3 years working at one of 6 research institutions in Europe (France, Germany, Greece, UK), will participate in an outstanding web science and data science training programme, and will have the chance to visit other of these organisations plus further application partners. The gross monthly salary (including social security, before taxes) is 3,110 € (adjusted depending on the country of employment) plus a mobility allowance of 600 €/month and, if applicable, a family allowance of 500 €/month.
Smart infrastructures and citizens participation in the digital society are increasingly data-driven. Sharing, connecting, managing, analysing and understanding data on the Web will enable better services for citizens, communities and industry. However, turning web data into successful services for the public and private sector requires skilled web and data scientists, and it still requires further research. WDAqua aims at advancing the state of the art by intertwining training, research and innovation efforts, centred around data-driven question answering. Question answering is immediately useful to a wide audience of end users, and we will demonstrate this in settings including e-commerce, public sector information, publishing and smart cities. Steps to answering a question are (1) understanding a spoken question, (2) analysing the questions text, (3) finding data to answer the question, and (4) presenting the answer(s). Every individual research project in WDAqua connects at least two of these steps.
Partner organisations (where PhD students may spend secondments):
The individual project partners make individual, specific job postings (linked above as soon as available). Candidates apply for individual jobs, with individual organisations, as listed above.
The ideal candidate must not have resided for more than 12 months in the country of their employment in the 3 years before starting to work (for full details, please check this document for the mobility rule). He or she holds a degree in computer science or a related field and is able to combine theory and practice in her/his work. Fluent English communication and a passion for developing modern software solutions (e.g. in Java/Scala, JavaScript) are fundamental requirements. Command of the language of the country of employment is a plus but not required. The candidate should have experience and commitment to work in teams and on the forefront of research in one of the following fields:
Application deadlines will be in February; each organisation will define a specific date in their job postings. You will need to submit a CV, university transcripts, a motivation letter including a short research plan targeted to the topics of the respective partner, two letters of recommendation and English writing sample (e.g. prior publication or master thesis excerpt). The individual organisations will announce specific requirements and guidelines.
Scholarships are not only for the smart students. Anyone can get scholarships
Have a Question about this Scholarship?