Description

We seek an ambitious and visionary researcher to strengthen our expertise in multi-robot systems for non-road environments. The successful candidate will develop novel methods and technologies enabling collaborative autonomy among heterogeneous robotic platforms operating in challenging outdoor conditions such as agriculture, mining, construction, logistics, forestry, and material and cargo handling.

This position supports TAU’s strategic commitment to sustainability and industrial renewal and Finland’s National Mobile Machine Growth Strategy. The successful candidate will advance research and education in multi-robot systems for non-road environments, with a strong emphasis on resource efficiency, human-centric automation, and industrial collaboration.

Your research may focus on lifelong coordination of multiple non-road robots with constraints and task assignments with any of the following themes or a combination thereof:

-          Cooperative multi robot systems in dynamic and unstructured environments (land, aerial, marine, or hybrid)

-          Distributed decision-making, task allocation, and worksite optimization under uncertainty

-          Energy-aware and resource-efficient collaboration strategies for fleets of autonomous machines

-          Multirobot sensor fusion and motion planning

Empirical research, technology piloting, validation, and industrial-scale deployment have an important role in this position.

If successful, you will be placed at the level of Assistant Professor, Associate Professor or Professor, based on your experience and expertise. While in the early stages of your career the focus is on research, building your own research group and supervision of doctoral student, in time you will be expected to contribute increasingly to teaching, curriculum development, and BSc and MSc student supervision. It is common that MSc and even BSc students join research groups as research assistant, providing them enthusiasm towards further studies. 

You are expected to pursue and supervise research in your topical area. Active collaboration with local, national, and global research partners, as well as industry is encouraged. Also, you are encouraged to foster synergy across research groups of the unit through joint projects and shared infrastructure. You are expected to secure external funding for your research as well as nurture interactions with relevant stakeholders for societal impact.

Salaries are based on the job demands and employees’ personal performance in accordance with the Finnish University Salary System. A typical starting salary for an Assistant Professor is approximately 4700-5200 EUR/month, for an Associate Professor approximately 5400-6100 EUR/month, and for a Professor in the range between 6500-7300 EUR/month. Higher salaries may be negotiated for candidates with exceptional experience and/or performance.

Requirements

-          You should have a doctoral degree in Automation Technology, Mechanical Engineering, Robotics or a related field.

-          Strong research background related to the position

-          Strong knowledge of sustainable technologies, processes and systems, and of tools and methodologies for their evaluation. 

-          Fluent in English  

-          Good cooperation and interaction skills.

Further requirements for each tenure track level are as follows:

Assistant Professor

• ability to undertake high-level scholarly activity and potential to establish an independent agenda of scholarly activity at international level of excellence
• teaching skills required to successfully perform the duties and functions of the position

Associate Professor 

• track record of independent scholarly activity on a high international level
• teaching skills required to successfully perform the duties and functions of the position  
• ability to lead a research group and acquire external funding. 

Professor

• high-level scholarly expertise
• experience of leading scientific research activities
• ability to provide high-quality research-based education and instruction
• track record of winning external research funding  
• track record of international scholarly activity