Career

In support of the research and development (R&D) contract from the U.S. Army Ground Vehicle Systems Center (GVSC), the Autonomous Vehicle Mobility Institute (AVMI) https://www.wpi.edu/research/centers/avmi at Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) https://www.wpi.edu/ in Massachusetts offers three Research Scientist positions. 

In this R&D program, AVMI will develop innovative solutions in digital engineering (DE) with its implementation in newly built laboratories. These capabilities offer a DE ecosystem/infrastructure and integrative methods, processes, and practices to conduct DE and support novel automated approaches for Human-Machine Integrated Formations (HMIF) modeling and simulation, development, design, testing and evaluation, and for the defense training and acquisition. Such approach provides the necessary DE components for AVMI as a digital & hardware artifact-based ecosystem of multiple X-realities, including real, virtual, and mixed realities.

The successful candidates will have an exceptional opportunity to build their professional careers and collaborate with AVMI researchers, WPI faculty and students from multiple departments, and private industries – working together and complementing each other on designing and establishing unique research and engineering laboratory facility on autonomous vehicles and HMIFs. 

Interested candidates should email a single PDF that includes:

1. A cover letter with a statement of purpose for a particular position (include the Position Reference Index),
2. CV with their qualifications, research achievements and clear indication of previous accomplishments, and motivation in a position of their interest. The names and contact information of three references should be included in the CV (the references will be contacted once an interview is scheduled)

to Prof. Vladimir Vantsevich vvantsevich@wpi.edu and Prof. Lee Moradi lmoradi@wpi.edu.

Review of applications will begin in May 2024, and continue until the positions are filled. Successful candidates may be appointed as early as September 1, 2024.

Position Index: AVMI-NAI-2024

This Research Scientist position is offered for basic and applied research in Natural and Responsible Artificial Intelligence. R&D work is in frontier areas of neural, non-neural, and distributed intelligence, and might include, but not limited to thinking and task learning, intelligent behavior when fulfilling a task and multi-task operations in dynamic environments, non-neural controls, and cognition and reasoning issues. Applications include Human-Machine Integrated Formations of humans and autonomous vehicles, vehicle autonomous systems, and systems of autonomous vehicles at various levels of autonomy and intelligence.

The person hired for this position is expected to develop a new research direction(s) in one or several above-listed areas and build a technical laboratory to lead his/her R&D at AVMI and contribute to the DE ecosystem. US citizenship, NATO nations citizenship or US Permanent Residency is required.

Position Index: AVMI-CSE-2024

This Research Scientist position is offered in computer science and software engineering and relates to algorithm design and software application design and development, testing, deploying and maintenance. R&D work is expected to be in frontier areas of digital engineering to enable real-time and faster-than-real-time physics-based simulation and virtualization in the ecosystem of Human-Machine Integrated Formations by advancing the ecosystem’s software framework and its modularity, improving and optimizing robustness of the operational system, middleware, and application software.   

The person hired for this position is expected to serve as a technical lead for the AVMI Autonomous Systems Laboratory by developing basic research and applied R&D in the above-listed areas. US citizenship, NATO nations citizenship or US Permanent Residency is required.

Position Index: AVMI-PVS-2024

This Research Scientist position is in research areas of physics-based modeling, simulation, and design of 

1. Exteroceptive sensors for the use in autonomous vehicles for navigation, perception, localization, look-ahead landscape/terrain identification, weather assessment, and terrain trafficability assessment in-real time, and 
2. Proprioceptive sensors embedded in vehicle powertrain and chassis systems for the use in autonomous control of autonomous vehicle systems. The research work will also include physical sensor design, physical and virtual sensor validation in varieties of environmental conditions and terrain texture, soil density and mechanical properties, etc. 

The person admitted for this position is expected to develop a new research direction(s) in one or several above-listed areas that include, although are not limited to sensors for facilitating vehicle autonomy, non-destructive soil identification methods, managing data of exteroceptive and proprioceptive sensors, machine learning algorithms for terrain recognition, etc. 

The successful candidate will build a technical laboratory to lead his/her sensor-related R&D at AVMI and contribute to the DE ecosystem. US citizenship, NATO nations citizenship or US Permanent Residency is required.

DoD SMART Scholarship - Research in autonomy and dynamics of vehicles in terrain conditions - https://www.smartscholarship.org/smart

Affiliated Department:  WPI - Mechanical and Materials Engineering

Location:  U.S. Army Ground Vehicle Systems Center, Warren, MI

Applications are invited from suitably qualified candidates for a position as a master’s student, or an undergraduate student expecting to graduate in May 2024, for the DoD SMART Scholarship to support his/her PhD (combined MS and PhD) study with full tuition and stipend. This position relates to the ongoing research work with the U.S. Army Ground Vehicle Systems Center (GVSC).

Applications for the DOD SMART Scholarship are required before December 1, 2024.  The successful applicant will start his/her research at GVSC in summer/fall 2025. The research will include dynamics, controls, simulation, and experimental validation of agile maneuvers of unmanned ground vehicles (UGVs) in terrain conditions. The student will work with a team of researchers to contribute to UGV modeling, simulation and design for maneuver, mobility, and energy efficiency.   

Qualifications required: knowledge of systems dynamics and related computational skills (MATLAB and Simulink).

Qualifications desired, but not mandatory: advanced skills in differential and integral calculus, stability of mechanical systems, and vehicle dynamics.

US Citizenship is required for this position.

Email your CV to:  Prof. Vladimir Vantsevich vvantsevich@wpi.edu and Prof. Lee Moradi lmoradi@wpi.edu.