postdoctoral research positions at PariSanté

Thanks to the 2023-2029 ERC Synergy grant OCEAN (On intelligenCE And Networks: Synergistic research in Bayesian Statistics, Microeconomics and Computer Sciences), I am seeking one or two postdoctoral researchers with an interest in Bayesian federated learning, distributed MCMC, approximate Bayesian inference and computing, and data privacy.

The project is based at Université Paris Dauphine, on the new PariSanté Campus.  The postdocs will join the OCEAN teams of researchers directed by Éric Moulines and myself (Christian P Robert) to work on the above themes with multiple possibilities of focus from statistical theory, to Bayesian methodology, to decision theory, to algorithms, to medical applications. Collaborations with the OCEAN teams of researchers directed by Michael Jordan (Berkeley) and Gareth Roberts (Warwick) will further be encouraged and related travel will be supported.

Qualifications

The candidates should hold a doctorate in applied maths, statistics or machine learning, with demonstrated skills in Bayesian analysis, game theory, Monte Carlo methodology or numerical probability, an excellent record of publications in these domains, and an interest in working as part of an interdisciplinary international team. Scientific maturity and research autonomy are a must for applying. There is no deadline for the positions, which will be filled when a suitable candidate is selected.

Funding

Besides a 2 year postdoctoral contract at Université Paris Dauphine (with possible extension for another year), at a salary of 31K€ per year, the project will fund travel to OCEAN partners’ institutions (University of Warwick or University of Berkeley) and participation to yearly summer schools and conferences. Standard French university benefits are attached to the position and no teaching duty is involved, as per ERC rules.

The starting date of the postdoctoral positions is negotiable depending on the applicants’ availability.

Application Procedure

• To apply, please send the following entries in one pdf file to Christian Robert (bayesianstatistics@gmail.com).
• a letter of application,
• a CV,

Letters of recommendation are to be sent directly by their author.

consolidator grants 2023

back to horizon

“[the UK rejoining Horizon Europe programme is] fantastic news not just for the UK but for scientists across the EU and for all the people of Europe”. Sir Adrian Smith, president of the Royal Society

The EU and the UK Government have come to an agreement on the UK rejoining the Horizon Europe funding programme after a gap of one year or so, after they resolved the dispute over the Northern Ireland protocol. With a further five months wasted by the UK Government seeking a more favourable “underperformance clause”. Although this reopening will not impact our ERC Synergy OCEAN grant, which is already running and is partly funded by substitution funds from the UK Government, this is great news for science and research.

400 bright minds

Contextual Integrity for Differential Privacy #3 [23w5106]

Morning of diverse short talks. First talk by Bei Jiang (Edmonton) on locally processed privacy for quantile estimation, which relates very much to our ongoing research with Stan, who is starting his ERC funded PhD on privacy. Randomised response, in having a positive probability of replacing indicators in the empirical cdf by a random or perturbed version whose bias can be corrected. I may have overdone the similarity though in confusing users with agents. Followed by a hacking foray by Joel Reardon (Calgary) into how much information is transmitted by apps on completely unrelated phone activity. (Moral: Never send a bug report.)

The afternoon break saw us visiting the Frind Estate winery on the other side of the lake. Meaning not only wine tasting (great Syrah!), and discovering an hybrid grape called Maréchal Foch, but also entering the lab with its mass spectrometer. (But no glimpse of the winemaking process per se…)