The Institute of Cosmos Sciences of the University of Barcelona (ICCUB) invites applications for a postdoctoral research fellow in computational galaxy formation within the new "Milky Way & neighbours" group led by Dr. Chervin Laporte. They will perform cosmological zoom-in simulations of galaxy formation, with a focus on dwarf galaxies and Milky Way-like systems. Candidates with interests and experience in modelling star formation, feedback processes, chemical evolution on galactic scales in a cosmological context are encouraged to apply. Experience in code-development and using high performance computing to run and analyse simulations of galaxy formation would be desirable.

They will also have the opportunity to be involved in the scientific exploitation of the Gaia mission, WEAVE as well as participating in international collaborative networks and supervising students (if they wish). The ICCUB offers a stimulating environment with scientific staff working on a variety of topics from cosmology, extragalactic and Galactic astronomy to star formation and gravitational wave detection. The term of employment is for 3 years with potential for extensions. The position is funded by an ERC starting grant and comes with access to supercomputing and travel support. Candidates should have completed their PhD within the last six years.

The ICCUB is an interdisciplinary centre with more than 60 long term scientists, 20 engineers and 80 postdoctoral researchers (55% international) and PhD students (30%international) offering an international and multicultural environment. The ICCUB also hosts a vibrant fundamental research program in cosmology, astrophysics and particle physics, with a strong technology unit supporting our participation in international collaborations in observational astronomy and experimental particle physics. The Institute is situated in Barcelona, which offers an outstanding scientific and cultural environment, entertainment and sports as well as outstanding food and music.

Applicants should submit a single PDF including a CV, a publication list and statement of research interests/plans (3 pages max.) and cover letter (optional) via the ICCUB application system. They should also provide three referees to be asked for a letter of reference. Applications received by January 1st, 2021 will receive full consideration, but the search will continue until the position is filled.

When you submit your application form with the three referees email address, our system automatically emails them requesting the recommendation letters and the instructions on how to submit them. Please check with your referees that they receive our email.

The Institute of Cosmos Sciences of the University of Barcelona (ICCUB) invites applications for a PhD studentship in galaxy formation in the new "Milky Way & neighbours" group led by Dr. Chervin Laporte. The main goal of the PhD is to study the early accretion history of the Milky Way through the development of numerical simulations of the stellar halo in a cosmological context using current available observational constraints. The aim of the project is to shed light on the dynamical structure and chemical properties of the most ancient galaxies (and their satellites) which were accreted and making testable predictions which can be investigated with current and upcoming large spectroscopic surveys of the Galaxy. These surveys will not only provide a six dimensional phase-space view of the stellar halo, but also unleash a whole array of complementary information through the measurement of different chemical abundances. The over-arching question/theme of the PhD is what can we learn about galaxy formation in the high-redshift Universe (as well as our own Galaxy) using the stellar halo of the Milky Way as a time machine? In this project, the student will develop skills in computational astrophysics further extending the versatility of existing N-body codes coupled with predictive models of galaxy formation in chemical abundance space. Some experience with coding (e.g. in C, C++, IDL or Python) would be very useful.

In this project, the student will also have the chance to be involved in the scientific exploitation of the Gaia mission, WEAVE as well as participating in international collaborative networks in computational astrophysics. The ICCUB offers a stimulating environment with scientific staff working on a variety of topics from cosmology, extragalactic and Galactic astronomy to star formation and gravitational wave detection.

The term of employment is for 3 years. The position is funded by an ERC starting grant and comes with access to supercomputing and travel support. The candidate should hold a Master’s degree in mathematics, physics or astrophysics The position is expected to begin around the fall of 2021, although exceptions can be made in cases of maternity/paternity or other special circumstances. ICCUB offers and promotes a diverse and inclusive environment and welcomes applicants regardless of age, disability, gender, nationality, race, religion or sexual orientation (for additional information please see the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Commission). Job seekers in need of a reasonable accommodation to complete the application process should email secretaria@icc.ub.edu with their request.

The ICCUB is an interdisciplinary centre with more than 60 long term scientists, 20 engineers and 80 postdoctoral researchers (55% international) and PhD students (30%international) offering an international and multicultural environment. The ICCUB also hosts a vibrant fundamental research program in cosmology, astrophysics and particle physics, with a strong technology unit supporting our participation in international collaborations in observational astronomy and experimental particle physics. The Institute is situated in Barcelona, which offers an outstanding scientific and cultural environment, entertainment and sports as well as outstanding food and music.

Applicants should send a single PDF including a CV, a cover letter motivating your application (indicating why you are applying), a research statement detailing your personal research interests and prior research experience in any field of physics/astrophysics/mathematics (2 pages max.), University transcripts (up to the moment of application in case you do not hold a Masters degree yet) via the ICCUB application system. They should also provide two referees to be asked for a letter of reference. Applications received by January 8th 2021 will receive full consideration, but the search will continue until the position is filled.

When you submit your application form with the three referees email address, our system automatically emails them requesting the recommendation letters and the instructions on how to submit them. Please check with your referees that they receive our email.

The Institute of Cosmos Sciences of the University of Barcelona (ICCUB) invites applications for a postdoctoral research associate in computational galaxy dynamics within the new research group of Dr. Chervin Laporte. Candidates with experience/interests in non-equilibrium dynamics are encouraged to apply. Experience in code-development, using high performance computing to run and analyse simulations (N-body and/or basis field expansion) and statistical modelling would be desirable. The fellow will develop an independent research line as well as participate in the group’s larger projects.

They will also have the opportunity to be involved in the scientific exploitation of the Gaia mission, WEAVE as well as participating in international collaborative networks and supervising students (if they wish). The ICCUB offers a stimulating environment with scientific staff working on a variety of topics from cosmology, extragalactic and Galactic astronomy to star formation and gravitational wave detection. The term of employment is for 3 years. The position is funded by an ERC starting grant and comes with access to supercomputing and travel support. Candidates should have completed their PhD within last six years.

The position is expected to begin around the fall of 2021, although exceptions can be made in cases of maternity/paternity or other special circumstances. ICCUB offers and promotes a diverse and inclusive environment and welcomes applicants regardless of age, disability, gender, nationality, race, religion or sexual orientation (for additional information please see the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Commission). Job seekers in need of a reasonable accommodation to complete the application process should email secretaria@icc.ub.edu with their request.

The ICCUB is an interdisciplinary centre with more than 60 long term scientists, 20 engineers and 80 postdoctoral researchers (55% international) and PhD students (30%international) offering an international and multicultural environment. The ICCUB also hosts a vibrant fundamental research program in cosmology, astrophysics and particle physics, with a strong technology unit supporting our participation in international collaborations in observational astronomy and experimental particle physics. The Institute is situated in Barcelona, which offers an outstanding scientific and cultural environment, entertainment and sports as well as outstanding food and music.

Applicants should send a single PDF including a CV, a publication list and statement of research interests/plans (3 pages max.) and cover letter (optional) via the ICCUB application system. They should also provide 3 referees to be asked for a letter of reference. Applications received by January 8th 2021 will receive full consideration, but the search will continue until the position is filled.

When you submit your application form with the three referees email address, our system automatically emails them requesting the recommendation letters and the instructions on how to submit them. Please check with your referees that they receive our email.

The ICCUB is an interdisciplinary centre with more than 60 long term scientists, 20 engineers and 80 postdoctoral researchers (55% international) and PhD students (30%international) offering an international and multicultural environment. The ICCUB also hosts a vibrant fundamental research program in cosmology, astrophysics and particle physics, with a strong technology unit supporting our participation in international collaborations in observational astronomy and experimental particle physics.

Job description

Key duties:

- Organize, carry out and disseminate the scientific and outreach activities of the Institute of Cosmos Sciences.

- Content creation and webpage maintenance of the Institute of Cosmos Sciences, as well as outreach web pages, serviAstro and serviParticles

- Design and develop outreach graphic material in coordination with the different groups of the institute

- Management of the social networks of the Institute of Cosmos Sciences, institutional and outreach

- Support in the elaboration of reports

- Support to the members of the Institute in the elaboration, diffusion and coordination of press releases and news with the University of Barcelona, the Institute of Space Studies of Catalonia and other institutions

- Elaboration of the press collection of the institute

- Support the Manager of the Institute of Cosmos Sciences

- Elaboration of newsletters and bulletins of internal and external news.

Requirements:

The candidates are expected to hold a Bachelor’s degree, preferably in sciences, and a Master or Postgrau in scientific communication will be appreciated.

• Level C1 in Catalan
• Level C1 in English
• Experience in writing news, press releases and reports
• Knowledge in graphic design (Ex.Photoshop, Illustrator, Lightroom)

• Experience managing social media accounts
• Experience in Website Content Manager (Ex. Drupal)

Employment conditions:

Position is for one years renewable for tw years depending on performance and funding.

Gross annual salary will be in the range of 27k€, with included social security and public healthcare benefits, covering spouse and children.

Position is expected to begin February or March 2021, although exceptions can be made in cases of maternity/paternity or other special circumstances.

The position will be located at Faculty of Physics of the University of Barcelona.

Equal Employment Opportunity Statement

ICCUB offers and promotes a diverse and inclusive environment and welcomes applicants regardless of age, disability, gender, nationality, race, religion or sexual orientation (for additional information please see the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Commission. Job seekers in need of a reasonable accommodation to complete the application process should email secretaria@icc.ub.edu with their request.

Application procedure:

All applications must be submitted through the University of Barcelona's system. More information here.

Deadline:

Applications should be submitted before January 12th.

You will have the opportunity to work in our highly interdisciplinary and international institute, where collaboration with different faculty members and research groups is nurtured and cultivated.

Applicants must have a PhD in Physics, Astrophysics or related fields, or be on track to obtain it by the time the contract starts.

Specific job advertisements:

• Postdoctoral Fellow in Dark Energy and the Origin of the Universe
• Postdoctoral Fellow in Fundamental Physics and Astrophysics from Gravitational Waves
• Postdoctoral Fellow in Strongly Coupled Matter
• Postdoctoral Fellow in Beyond the Standard Model: New Particles and Dark Matter
• Postdoctoral Fellow in Structure and Evolution of the Milky Way Galaxy through Gaia
• Postdoctoral Fellow in Quantum Computation and Simulation

Employment conditions:

Positions are for two years renewable for a third year depending on performance and funding.

Gross annual salary will be in the range of 32 to 36 k€, with included social security and public healthcare benefits, covering spouse and children.

Positions are expected to begin no later than the fall of 2021, although exceptions can be made in cases of maternity/paternity or other special circumstances. More information on specific positions associated to each of the research lines can be found here.

Equal Employment Opportunity Statement

ICCUB offers and promotes a diverse and inclusive environment and welcomes applicants regardless of age, disability, gender, nationality, race, religion or sexual orientation (for additional information please see the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Commission. Job seekers in need of a reasonable accommodation to complete the application process should call or email secretaria@icc.ub.edu with their request.

Application procedure:

Documents that will be required for your application are:

• Curriculum Vitae
• Research Description and Plan (maximum 6 pages)
• Three letters of recommendation
• URL to publications in a public database
  

Click here to submit your apllication

Inquiries about the application submission can be directed to Esther Pallares (secretaria@icc.ub.edu)

Deadline:

Applications should be uploaded in here before December 8th to receive full consideration, but those uploaded later will also be considered until positions are filled.

This positions are financed by the State Agency for Research of the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation through the "Unit of Excellence María de Maeztu 2020-2023" award to the Institute of Cosmos Sciences (CEX2019-000918-M)

The Unit of Excellence Maria de Maeztu recognition has been awarded by the Spanish Government in 2020 for the second time to the ICCUB, as a center with a highly competitive strategic research programmes in the frontiers of knowledge.

The Institute of Cosmos Sciences of the University of Barcelona (ICCUB) is seeking a Postdoctoral Fellow in Dark Energy and the Origin of the Universe for its Unit of Excellence Maria de Maeztu postdoctoral positions. Find out more positions in related areas here.

The ICCUB is an interdisciplinary center with more than 60 long term scientists, 20 engineers and 80 postdoctoral researchers (55% international) and PhD students (30%international) offering an international and multicultural environment. The ICCUB also hosts a vibrant fundamental research program in cosmology, astrophysics and particle physics, with a strong technology unit supporting our participation in international collaborations in observational astronomy and experimental particle physics.

Job description

We are looking for enthusiastic researchers who share our curiosity to understand the physics of the Universe from the infinitely small to the infinitely large and the deep connections between these different scales.

You will have the opportunity to work on large-scale structure cosmology, (both theoretical and observational), dark energy and Early Universe.

Forthcoming surveys with exquisite statistical power promise advances on big open questions with deep links to fundamental physics: the nature of dark energy and dark matter, neutrino masses, the early Universe physics driving inflation, etc.

The rapidly growing amount of data in cosmological surveys demands a strong analysis effort to extract important scientific discoveries; a close interaction between theory and observations is crucial for formulating the most relevant questions and developing precise data analysis techniques to find the correct answers.

We anticipate that this process will be strongly influenced by the nascent field of multi-messenger cosmology: gravitational waves with electromagnetic counterparts (e.g, providing redshift measurements). As an example of promising synergies, this combination will result in independent distance measurements, and cross-correlating gravitational wave sources with galaxy maps can trace the origin of black hole mergers (see line B here).

You will be joining a broad group of researchers with interests in Cosmology, -- see https://sites.google.com/icc.ub.edu/liciaverde/ (under GROUP) and http://icc.ub.edu/research/research_areas/theoretical_cosmology -- which comprises 5 faculty, 4 postdocs, and 8 graduate students.

Experience with cosmology, analysis of data, statistics, possibly applied in the cosmological context and being proficient with coding is highly desirable. Familiarity with inflation, general relativity and field theory would be valued. Familiarity with high performance computing is a welcome plus.

Members of this group are involved in the following surveys/collaborations: DESI, EUCLID.

The priority lines of the Maria de Maeztu proposal canbe found here.

To know more about the research interests of the ICCUB, please follow this link.

Employment conditions:

Position is for two yearsrenewable for a third year depending on performance and funding.

Gross annual salary will be inthe range of 32 to 36 k€, with included social security and public healthcare benefits, covering spouse and children.

Position is expected to beginno later than the fall of 2021, although exceptions can be made in cases ofmaternity/paternity or other special circumstances.

Equal Employment Opportunity Statement

ICCUB offers and promotes adiverse and inclusive environment and welcomes applicants regardless of age, disability, gender, nationality, race, religion or sexual orientation (for additional information please see the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Commission. Job seekers in need of a reasonable accommodation to complete the application process should email secretaria@icc.ub.eduwith their request.

Application procedure:

Documents that will be required for your application are:

• Curriculum Vitae
• Research Description and Plan (maximum 6 pages)
• Three letters of recommendation
• URL to publications in a public database

All applications must be submitted online through this link.

Inquiries about the application submission can be directed to Esther Pallares (secretaria@icc.ub.edu).

For inquiries about the scientific aspects, please contact Prof. Licia Verde (liciaverde@icc.ub.edu) or Prof. Jaume Garriga (jgarriga@fqa.ub.edu)

Deadline:

Applications should be uploaded in here before December 8th to receive full consideration, but those uploaded later will also be considered until positions are filled.

Funding:

The position is financed by the State Agency for Research of the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation through the "Unit of Excellence María de Maeztu 2020-2023" award to the Institute of Cosmos Sciences (CEX2019-000918-M).

The Unit of Excellence Maria de Maeztu recognition has been awarded by the Spanish Government in 2020 for the second time to the ICCUB, as a center with a highly competitive strategic research programmes in the frontiers of knowledge.

The Institute of Cosmos Sciences of the University of Barcelona (ICCUB) is seeking to appoint at least one Postdoctoral Fellow in Fundamental Physics and Astrophysics from Gravitational Waves for its Unit of Excellence Maria de Maeztu postdoctoral positions. Find out more positions in related areas here.

The ICCUB is an interdisciplinary center with more than 60 long term scientists, 20 engineers and 80 postdoctoral researchers (55% international) and PhD students (30% international) offering an international and multicultural environment. The ICCUB also hosts a vibrant fundamental research program in cosmology, astrophysics and particle physics, with a strong technology unit supporting our participation in international collaborations in observational astronomy and experimental particle physics.

Job description

The candidate can pursue independent research within the broad theme "Fundamental Physics and Astrophysics from Gravitational Waves". The ICC is a full member of the Virgo collaboration and to consolidate our scientific participation in the collaboration we welcome in particular research proposals that benefit from Virgo membership. Within the broad research framework of this post, ICC staff members are active in the areas of gravity and extremely compact objects, dynamical binary black hole formation, primordial black holes and the equation-of-state of neutron stars.

More information about research group composition can be found here:

http://icc.ub.edu/research/research_areas/theoretical_cosmology

http://icc.ub.edu/research/research_areas/gravitational_waves

The priority lines of the Maria de Maeztu proposal canbe found here.

To know more about the research interests of the ICCUB, please follow this link.

Employment conditions:

Position is for two years renewable for a third year depending on performance and funding.

Gross annual salary will be in the range of 32 to 36 k€, with included social security and public healthcare benefits, covering spouse and children.

Position is expected to begin no later than the fall of 2021, although exceptions can be made in cases of maternity/paternity or other special circumstances.

Equal Employment Opportunity Statement

ICCUB offers and promotes a diverse and inclusive environment and welcomes applicants regardless of age, disability, gender, nationality, race, religion or sexual orientation (for additional information please see the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Commission). Job seekers in need of a reasonable accommodation to complete the application process should email secretaria@icc.ub.edu with their request.

Application procedure:

Documents that will be required for your application are:

·Curriculum Vitae

·Research Description and Plan (maximum 6 pages)

·Three letters of recommendation

·URL to publications in a public database

All applications must be submitted online through this link.

Inquiries about the application submission can be directed to Esther Pallares (secretaria@icc.ub.edu).

For inquiries about the scientific aspects, please contact Prof. Roberto Emparan (emparan@ub.edu) or Prof. Mark Gieles (mgieles@ub.edu).

Deadline:

Applications should be uploaded in here before December 8th to receive full consideration, but those uploaded later will also be considered until positions are filled.

Funding:

The position is financed by the State Agency for Research of the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovationt hrough the "Unit of Excellence María de Maeztu 2020-2023" award to the Institute of Cosmos Sciences (CEX2019-000918-M).

The Unit of Excellence Maria de Maeztu recognition has been awarded by the Spanish Government in 2020 for the second time to the ICCUB, as a center with a highly competitive strategic research programmes in the frontiers of knowledge.

The Institute of Cosmos Sciences of the University of Barcelona (ICCUB) is seeking a Postdoctoral Fellow in Structure and Evolution of the Milky Way Galaxy through Gaia for its Unit of Excellence Maria de Maeztu postdoctoral positions. Find out more positions in related areas here.

The ICCUB is an interdisciplinary center with more than 60 long term scientists, 20 engineers and 80 postdoctoral researchers (55% international) and PhD students (30%international) offering an international and multicultural environment. The ICCUB also hosts a vibrant fundamental research program in cosmology, astrophysics and particle physics, with a strong technology unit supporting our participation in international collaborations in observational astronomy and experimental particle physics.

Job description

The vast improvement in astrometric accuracy for nearly 2 billion stars achieved by the Gaia mission is revolutionizing the studies of theMilky Way (MW) and their relation to cosmology. The ICCUB is uniquely positioned for science exploitation because of 1) our participation in the mission since its beginning, 2) our local expertise on galactic dynamics and 3)our leadership in building the Gaia Archive with its associated repository and Data Mining systems. The ICCUB Technological Unit is developing tools for data processing, distributed computing and big data to exploit more efficiently the Gaia Archive.

We are seeking candidates who can make a significant contribution to the understanding of the structure and history of the MW, improving upon the local and current description of the MW, and which help usunderstand galaxies in a cosmological framework, by using the upcoming third Gaia Data releases (end 2020 and first half of 2022) and related surveys (e.g.Gaia-ESO, WEAVE, 4MOST, OCCASO, MIRADAS and JPLUS/JPAS).

This includes research in topics like the stellar initial mass function and star formation history of the MW components; Galactic dynamics (spiral arms and bar dynamics, perturbation from external galaxies, streams etc); the MW chemical evolution traced by field stars and clusters coupled with Galactic dynamics; modelling of the substructures of star-forming regions revealed by Gaia; globular clusters and the initial mass function athigh-redshift ; characterization of the ultra-faint dwarf-galaxy population around the MW to test DM models . Synergies among topics and with the other priority lines in the ICCUB will be evaluated positively.

The priority lines of the Maria de Maeztu proposal canbe found here.

To know more about the research interests of the ICCUB, please follow this link.

Employment conditions:

Position is for two yearsrenewable for a third year depending on performance and funding.

Gross annual salary will be inthe range of 32 to 36 k€, with included social security and public healthcare benefits, covering spouse and children.

Position is expected to beginno later than the fall of 2021, although exceptions can be made in cases ofmaternity/paternity or other special circumstances.

Equal Employment Opportunity Statement

ICCUB offers and promotes adiverse and inclusive environment and welcomes applicants regardless of age, disability, gender, nationality, race, religion or sexual orientation (for additional information please see the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Commission. Job seekers in need of a reasonable accommodation to complete the application process should email secretaria@icc.ub.eduwith their request.

Application procedure:

Documents that will be required for your application are:

Curriculum Vitae

Research Description and Plan (maximum 6 pages)

Three letters of recommendation

URL to publications in a public database

All applications must be submitted online through this link.

Inquiries about the application submission can be directed to Esther Pallares (secretaria@icc.ub.edu).

For inquiries about the scientific aspects, please contact Carme Jordi (carme@icc.ub.edu)

Deadline:

Applications should be uploaded in here before December 8th to receive full consideration, but those uploaded later will also be considered until positions are filled.

Funding:

The position is financed by the State Agency for Research of the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation through the "Unit of Excellence María de Maeztu 2020-2023" award to the Institute of Cosmos Sciences (CEX2019-000918-M).

The Unit of Excellence Maria de Maeztu recognition has been awarded by the Spanish Government in 2020 for the second time to the ICCUB, as a center with a highly competitive strategic research programmes in the frontiers of knowledge.

The Institute of Cosmos Sciences of the University of Barcelona (ICCUB) is seeking a Postdoctoral Fellow in Quantum Computation and Simulation for its Unit of Excellence Maria de Maeztu postdoctoral positions. Find out more positions in related areas here.

The ICCUB is an interdisciplinary center with more than 60 long term scientists, 20 engineers and 80 postdoctoral researchers (55% international) and PhD students (30%international) offering an international and multicultural environment. The ICCUB also hosts a vibrant fundamental research program in cosmology, astrophysics and particle physics, with a strong technology unit supporting our participation in international collaborations in observational astronomy and experimental particle physics.

Job description

The candidates are expected to hold a PhD in physics, mathematics, computer science, or any related area.

A strong background in one or several of the following topics will be especially considered:

Quantum many-body theory, Quantum Simulation, Ultracold atomic gases, Tensor Networks, Quantum information inspired approaches to field and gauge theories, Quantum computation, Quantum Optics and Nanophotonics.

Faculty members of our group working in these areas include Maria Moreno-Cardoner, Muntsa Guilleumas, Sofyan Iblisdir, Bruno Julia-Diaz y Luca Tagliacozzo.

The priority lines of the Maria de Maeztu proposal canbe found here.

To know more about the research interests of the ICCUB, please follow this link.

Employment conditions:

Position is for two yearsrenewable for a third year depending on performance and funding.

Gross annual salary will be inthe range of 32 to 36 k€, with included social security and public healthcare benefits, covering spouse and children.

Position is expected to beginno later than the fall of 2021, although exceptions can be made in cases ofmaternity/paternity or other special circumstances.

Equal Employment Opportunity Statement

ICCUB offers and promotes adiverse and inclusive environment and welcomes applicants regardless of age, disability, gender, nationality, race, religion or sexual orientation (for additional information please see the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Commission. Job seekers in need of a reasonable accommodation to complete the application process should email secretaria@icc.ub.eduwith their request.

Application procedure:

Documents that will be required for your application are:

• Curriculum Vitae
• Research Description and Plan (maximum 6 pages)
• Three letters of recommendation
• URL to publications in a public database

All applications must be submitted online through this link.

Inquiries about the application submission can be directed to Esther Pallares (secretaria@icc.ub.edu).

For inquiries about the scientific aspects, please contact Prof. Bruno Julià (bruno@fqa.ub.edu)

Deadline:

Applications should be uploaded in here before December 8th to receive full consideration, but those uploaded later will also be considered until positions are filled.

Funding:

The position is financed by the State Agency for Research of the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation through the "Unit of Excellence María de Maeztu 2020-2023" award to the Institute of Cosmos Sciences (CEX2019-000918-M).

The Unit of Excellence Maria de Maeztu recognition has been awarded by the Spanish Government in 2020 for the second time to the ICCUB, as a center with a highly competitive strategic research programmes in the frontiers of knowledge.

The Institute of Cosmos Sciences of the University of Barcelona (ICCUB) is seeking a Postdoctoral Fellow in Beyond the Standard Model: New Particles and Dark Matter for its Unit of Excellence Maria de Maeztu postdoctoral positions. Find out more positions in related areas here.

The ICCUB is an interdisciplinary center with more than 60 long term scientists, 20 engineers and 80 postdoctoral researchers (55% international) and PhD students (30%international) offering an international and multicultural environment. The ICCUB also hosts a vibrant fundamental research program in cosmology, astrophysics and particle physics, with a strong technology unit supporting our participation in international collaborations in observational astronomy and experimental particle physics.

Job description

The candidates are expected to have, or be about to submit, a PhD degree in particle physics with a strong background in one or several the following topics: Flavour Physics, bot phenomenology or experimental High Energy Physics, including, but no limited to, beyond the SM physics, dark Matter direct detection (Xenon phenomenology), axion physics (IAXO) and axion detection by radio-frequency (RADES).

Faculty members of our group working in these areas include Federico Mescia, Eugeni Graugés, Lluís Garrido, Joan Soto, Domènec Espriu, Concepción González, Javier Virto, Jordi Miralda, Alessio Notari and Jorge Casalderrey.

The priority lines of the Maria de Maeztu proposal canbe found here.

To know more about the research interests of the ICCUB, please follow this link.

Employment conditions:

Position is for two yearsrenewable for a third year depending on performance and funding.

Gross annual salary will be inthe range of 32 to 36 k€, with included social security and public healthcare benefits, covering spouse and children.

Position is expected to beginno later than the fall of 2021, although exceptions can be made in cases ofmaternity/paternity or other special circumstances.

Equal Employment Opportunity Statement

ICCUB offers and promotes adiverse and inclusive environment and welcomes applicants regardless of age, disability, gender, nationality, race, religion or sexual orientation (for additional information please see the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Commission. Job seekers in need of a reasonable accommodation to complete the application process should email secretaria@icc.ub.eduwith their request.

Application procedure:

Documents that will be required for your application are:

• Curriculum Vitae
• Research Description and Plan (maximum 6 pages)
• Three letters of recommendation
• URL to publications in a public database

All applications must be submitted online through this link.

Inquiries about the application submission can be directed to Esther Pallares (secretaria@icc.ub.edu).

For inquiries about the scientific aspects, please contact Federico Mescia (mescia@fqa.ub.edu)

Deadline:

Applications should be uploaded in here before December 8th to receive full consideration, but those uploaded later will also be considered until positions are filled.

Funding:

The position is financed by the State Agency for Research of the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation through the "Unit of Excellence María de Maeztu 2020-2023" award to the Institute of Cosmos Sciences (CEX2019-000918-M).

The Unit of Excellence Maria de Maeztu recognition has been awarded by the Spanish Government in 2020 for the second time to the ICCUB, as a center with a highly competitive strategic research programmes in the frontiers of knowledge.

The Institute of Cosmos Sciences of the University of Barcelona (ICCUB) is seeking a Postdoctoral Fellow in Beyond the Standard Model: New Particles and Dark Matter for its Unit of Excellence Maria de Maeztu postdoctoral positions. Find out more positions in related areas here.

The ICCUB is an interdisciplinary center with more than 60 long term scientists, 20 engineers and 80 postdoctoral researchers (55% international) and PhD students (30%international) offering an international and multicultural environment. The ICCUB also hosts a vibrant fundamental research program in cosmology, astrophysics and particle physics, with a strong technology unit supporting our participation in international collaborations in observational astronomy and experimental particle physics.

Job description

We will investigate the properties of strongly coupled matter in two situations with potential synergies with other lines, especially with gravitational waves.

1. Strongly coupled matter in a cosmological context. Motivations for this come from the QCD phase transition one microsecond after the Big Bang, from the possible existence of Grand Unified Theories beyond the Standard Model, or from the possibility that dark matter is strongly self-interacting. We will pay particular attention to the production of gravitational waves, especially in the presence of phase transitions. There are also potential implications for new production mechanisms of primordial black holes.

2. Strongly coupled matter in neutron star mergers. The gravitational wave signal produced in these mergers depends on the properties of strongly coupled QCD matter, ranging from static ones (equation of state) to dynamical ones (transport coefficients, etc). We will employ a variety of approaches to connect these microscopic properties to the experimental signal detected at LIGO and VIRGO.

The priority lines of the Maria de Maeztu proposal canbe found here.

To know more about the research interests of the ICCUB, please follow this link.

Employment conditions:

Position is for two yearsrenewable for a third year depending on performance and funding.

Gross annual salary will be inthe range of 32 to 36 k€, with included social security and public healthcare benefits, covering spouse and children.

Position is expected to beginno later than the fall of 2021, although exceptions can be made in cases ofmaternity/paternity or other special circumstances.

Equal Employment Opportunity Statement

ICCUB offers and promotes adiverse and inclusive environment and welcomes applicants regardless of age, disability, gender, nationality, race, religion or sexual orientation (for additional information please see the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Commission. Job seekers in need of a reasonable accommodation to complete the application process should email secretaria@icc.ub.eduwith their request.

Application procedure:

Documents that will be required for your application are:

• Curriculum Vitae
• Research Description and Plan (maximum 6 pages)
• Three letters of recommendation
• URL to publications in a public database

All applications must be submitted online through this link.

Inquiries about the application submission can be directed to Esther Pallares (secretaria@icc.ub.edu).

For inquiries about the scientific aspects, please contact Prof. David Mateos (dmateos@fqa.ub.edu) or Prof. Àngels Aran (ramos@fqa.ub.edu)

Deadline:

Applications should be uploaded in here before December 8th to receive full consideration, but those uploaded later will also be considered until positions are filled.

Funding:

The position is financed by the State Agency for Research of the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation through the "Unit of Excellence María de Maeztu 2020-2023" award to the Institute of Cosmos Sciences (CEX2019-000918-M).

The Unit of Excellence Maria de Maeztu recognition has been awarded by the Spanish Government in 2020 for the second time to the ICCUB, as a center with a highly competitive strategic research programmes in the frontiers of knowledge.

Postdoctoral positions are now open at the Institute of Cosmos Sciences (ICC) at the University of Barcelona. Candidates in the following areas are encouraged to apply:

• Particle physics phenomenology related to neutrino physics, Higgs physics, B physics and effective theories, and heavy ion physics.
• Cosmology and astroparticle physics.
• String theory and holography broadly defined.

Faculty members of our group working in these areas include Jorge Casalderrey-Solana, Domenec Espriu, Joaquim Gomis, M.C. Gonzalez-Garcia, Federico Mescia, Josep Maria Pons, Jorge Russo, Joan Sola, Joan Soto, Josep Taron and Javier Virto.

For more information about research at the ICC please visit http://icc.ub.edu

Employment conditions

Appointments will be for a period of 2+1 years with the third year subject to performance and funding availability.

The default starting date will be in the Fall 2021, but earlier starting dates can be considered. The deadline for applications is November 30, 2020.

Applications procedure

Applications must be done online through the ICC application.

Applications should include a CV, a statement of research interests, a list of publications, and the letters of recommendation from three senior physicists.

Inquiries about the application submission can be directed to Miriam Gutiérrez (secretaria@icc.ub.edu).

We also recommend to the applicants to send a short email to the faculty member of our group whose work is more closely related to their interest letting them know of their application.

Equal Employment Opportunity Statement

The Institute of Cosmos Sciences is an equal employment opportunity employer. The Institute of Cosmos Sciences promotes a diverse and inclusive environment and welcomes applicants regardless of age, disability, gender, nationality, race, religion or sexual orientation. We strongly encourage women and underrepresented minorities in physical sciences to apply. For additional information please see the Diversity, equity and inclusion Commission. Job seekers in need of a reasonable accommodation to complete the application process should call or email secretaria@icc.ub.edu with their request.

Deadline: Please submit your applications by November 30th, 2020

Contact: Gonzalez-Garcia, Maria Concepción, email: concha@fqa.ub.edu

Postdoctoral positions funded by the String Theory, Gravitation and Cosmology group at the Institute of Cosmos Sciences (ICC), University of Barcelona, are now open.

Faculty members at our group include Roberto Emparan, Bartomeu Fiol, Jaume Garriga, Cristiano Germani, David Mateos, Alessio Notari and Enric Verdaguer.

For information about research at the ICC please visit http://icc.ub.edu

Appointments will begin in the Fall of 2021 for a period of 2+1 years, with the third year subject to performance and funding availability. The deadline for applications is November 30th 2020.

The University of Barcelona is part of a group of European institutes with a centralized system of postdoctoral applications. Candidates should apply through the following website, choosing Barcelona as one of their preferred institutes:

Interested candidates are also encouraged to apply to other ICC postdoctoral positions in related areas at http://icc.ub.edu/job/offers

Equal Employment Opportunity Statement

The Institute of Cosmos Sciences is an equal employment opportunity employer. The Institute of Cosmos Sciences promotes a diverse and inclusive environment and welcomes applicants regardless of age, disability, gender, nationality, race, religion or sexual orientation. We strongly encourage women and underrepresented minorities in physical sciences to apply. For additional information please see the Diversity, equity and inclusion Commission.

The Institute of Cosmos Sciences of the University of Barcelona (ICCUB) is seeking a Software Engineer to join the Softwareand Data Engineering department of The Technological Unit of the ICCUB.

The ICCUB (http://icc.ub.edu)is an interdisciplinary center devoted to fundamental research in the fields ofcosmology, astrophysics and particle physics. The ICCUB Technology Unit focuseson inventing and building the ambitious and innovative detection instruments ofthe future. This involves collaborating on large projects related to particlephysics experiments, space missions, astronomical facilities and others.

The ICCUB is a center with more than 60 long term scientists, 20 engineers and 80 postdoctoral researchers(55% international) and PhD students (30% international) offering aninternational and multicultural environment. The ICCUB also hosts a vibrant fundamental research program in cosmology, astrophysics and particle physics, with a strong technology unit supporting our participation in international collaborations in observational astronomy and experimental particle physics.

Job description

Currently, the unit is composed by a team of around 20 engineers and researchers divided in two departments, Electronics & Instrumentation and Software and Data Engineering. The Software and Data Engineering department designs software to help producing high quality datasets, which give significance to the experiments and to the Physics behind, like Gaia (https://sci.esa.int/web/gaia) or LHCb (http://lhcb.web.cern.ch/).

Since 2018, the ICCUB participates at scientific and technological level in Virgo (https://www.virgo-gw.eu/). Virgo is a large Michelson interferometer with 3km arms, designed to detect gravitational waves predicted by the general theory of relativity.

We search for a highly motivated Software Engineer with demonstrated experience in collaborative software development for high-performance or high-throughput computing environments.

To know more about the research interests of the ICCUB,please follow this link.

Taks:

The main tasks to develop are:

• Support to the low-latency and alerts system:
• Act as a reviewer of merge requests in Git
• Take in charge coding and tests of change requests discussed within the LIGO/Virgo low-latency group
• Support the implementation of a full end-to-end test facility with some component deployed at a Virgo Computing Centre and some on cloud (such as AWS)
• Participate in the porting to cloud (via Ansible + Docker swarm / Kubernetes) of low-latency components
• Support the deployment of are dundant hosting of GraceDB in Europe
• Support to computing pipelines and data handling frameworks
• Implementation of file catalogue and accounting systems
• Implementation of an adequate Workflow Management System
• Optimization and improvements of data analysis pipelines
• E.g., revision and optimization of the whitening algorithm
• Improvement of Virgo data handling
• Discuss and, if agreed, support the migration of raw data from Frames to HDF5
• Study the application of optimized data compressors to raw data
• Preparations for Einstein Telescope (ET)
• Study the ET case and work outan initial proposal (in collaboration with Virgo computing experts) for its data handling and computing strategy

Requirements:

• Bachelor Degree or equivalent
• Master Degree or equivalent
• English C1 level

Essencials:

• Linux, shell scripting, C/C++ and Python programming

Desirable:

• SVNand/or Git, CMake, Conda
• Knowledge or expertise on high-performance or high-throughput computing (speciallyHTCondor)
• Knowledge or expertise on Docker, Kubernetes, ROOT, HDF5

Bonus track (desirable but not so important):

• Knowledge or expertise on Rucio, Kafka, CVMF

Employment conditions:

We offer a full-time contractfor a period of three years with a 6 months trial period.

Gross annual salary will be in the range of 34 to 35 k€, with included social security and public healthcare benefits, covering spouse and children.

Position is expected to begin on1^st January 2021, although exceptions can be made in cases of maternity/paternity or other special circumstances.

Equal Employment Opportunity Statement

ICCUB offers and promotes adiverse and inclusive environment and welcomes applicants regardless of age, disability, gender, nationality, race, religion or sexual orientation (for additional information please see the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Commission. Job seekers in need of a reasonable accommodation to complete the application process should call or email secretaria@icc.ub.eduwith their request.

Application procedure:

Documents that will be requiredfor your application are:

• Curriculum Vitae
• Motivation letter

All applications must send an email to Dr. Jordi Portell (jportell@fqa.ub.edu).

Deadline:

Applications should be submitted before November 15th to receive full consideration, but those uploaded later will also be considered until positions are filled.

Funding:

The position is financed by the State Agency for Research of the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation through the "Unit of Excellence María de Maeztu 2020-2023" award to the Institute of Cosmos Sciences (CEX2019-000918-M).

The Unit of Excellence Maria de Maeztu recognition has been awarded by the Spanish Government in 2020 for the second time to the ICCUB, as a center with a highly competitive strategic research programmes in the frontiers of knowledge.

Our research group at the Institute of Cosmos Sciences in the University of Barcelona (ICCUB) is looking for a Doctoral candidate (PhD student) to work in the field of Extragalactic Astronomy.

We offer a pre-doctoral contract of up to 4 years in total funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation through its FPI 2020 call.

Our grup has an ample trajectory in the field of galaxy formation and evolution by means of theoretical modelling of evolutionary mechanisms, numerical simulations of galaxies in associations and statistical computing applied to large datasets.

The scientific interests range from to the study of the nurturing effects of the environment on galaxies, through the phenomenon of active galaxy nuclei, to the formation of the diffuse intergalactic light.

We also have important national and international collaborations and participate in several observational projects involving top-level ground-based facilities such as the CAHA 3.5m telescope at Calar Alto, MeerKAT and the VLA.

The successful candidate is expected to submit a PhD thesis before the end of the contract. He/she will conduct research in the life history of present-day lenticular galaxies. The main goal of the thesis will be to look for possible differences in the evolutionary paths that these objects follow according to the environmnet in which they reside and identify the physical mechanisms driving them.

This subject will be approached from the perspective of a comprehensive analysis of photometric and spectral measurements of the local lenticular galaxy population, with special emphasis in the exploitation of the large database of spatially resolved spectra provided by the SDSS survey MaNGA.

Suitable candidates are those who are enrolled or admitted to a doctoral program for the 2020/2021 academic year at the time of submission of the application or that are in a position to be on the date the contract is formalized.

Applications must be submitted online at the URL of the Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación from October 13 to October 27, 2020 at 2:00PM CET. To request the present research project please use the following reference: PID2019-106027GB-C43.

ICCUB offers and promotes a diverse and inclusive environment (for additional information please see the Diversity, equity and inclusion Commission) and strongly encourages women and underrepresented minorities in physical sciences to apply.

Inquiries about the scientific aspects of the contract should be addressed to jm.solanes@ub.edu

The ICCUB is an interdisciplinary center with more than 60 long term scientists, 20 engineers and 80 postdoctoral researchers (55% international) and PhD students (30%international) offering an international and multicultural environment. The ICCUB also hosts a vibrant fundamental research program in cosmology,astrophysics and particle physics, with a strong technology unit supporting our participation in international collaborations in observational astronomy and experimental particle physics.

The Unit of Excellence Maria de Maeztu recognition has been awarded by the Spanish Government in 2020 for the second time to the ICCUB, as a center with a highly competitive strategic research programmes in the frontiers of knowledge. Thanks to this recognition, it is available in the Aid for pre-doc contracts for the training of doctors (FPI 2020 call) the following project, funded by the Ministry of Science and Innovation:

- Strongly Coupled Matter, PI David Mateos, Reference CEX2019-000918-M-20-2

We will investigate the properties of strongly coupled matter in two situations with potential synergies with other lines, especially with gravitational waves.

1. Strongly coupled matter in a cosmological context. Motivations for this come from the QCD phase transition one microsecond after the Big Bang, from the possible existence of Grand Unified Theories beyond the Standard Model, or from the possibility that dark matter is strongly self-interacting. We will pay particular attention to the production of gravitational waves, especially in the presence of phase transitions. There are also potential implications for new production mechanisms of primordial black holes.

2. Strongly coupled matter in neutron star mergers. The gravitational wave signal produced in these mergers depends on the properties of strongly coupled QCD matter, ranging from static ones (equation of state) to dynamical ones (transport coefficients, etc). We will employ a variety of approaches to connect these microscopic properties to the experimental signal detected at LIGO and VIRGO.

Requirements:

Who can apply for a grant for pre-doctoral contracts for the training of doctors 2020?

Applicants may be all those who are enrolled or admitted to a doctoral program for the 2020/2021 academic year, at the time of submission of the application. Applicants may also be all those people who, at the time of submission of the application, not being enrolled or admitted to a doctoral program, are in a position to be on the date on which the contract is formalized, in accordance with article 18.

Applications must be submitted online at the URL (https://sede.micinn.gob.es/ayudaspredoctorales/) of the Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación from October 13 to October 27, 2020 at 2:00PM CET. To request the present research project please use the following reference: CEX2019-000918-M-20-2.

Employment conditions:

What is the annual gross amount of the pre-doctoral contracts?

The minimum salary compensation that researchers in training must receive will be 16,250 euros gross per year for each of the first two years, 17,410 for the third year and 21,760 for the fourth year.

What is the duration of the aid?

Four years.

More information here

ICCUB offers and promotes a diverse and inclusive environment (for additional information please see the Diversity, equity and inclusion Commission) and strongly encourages women and underrepresented minorities in physical sciences to apply.

Contact: David Mateos (dmateos@icc.ub.edu)

The ICCUB is an interdisciplinary center with more than 60 long term scientists, 20 engineers and 80 postdoctoral researchers (55% international) and PhD students (30%international) offering an international and multicultural environment. The ICCUB also hosts a vibrant fundamental research program in cosmology, astrophysics and particle physics, with a strong technology unit supporting our participation in international collaborations in observational astronomy and experimental particle physics.

The Unit of Excellence Maria de Maeztu recognition has been awarded by the Spanish Government in 2020 for the second time to the ICCUB, as a center with a highly competitive strategic research programmes in the frontiers of knowledge. Thanks to this recognition, it is avalaible in the Aid for pre-doc contracts for the training of doctors (FPI 2020 call) the following project, funded by the Ministry of Science and Innovation:

- Fundamental Physics and Astrophysics from Gravitational Waves, PI Mark Gieles, Reference CEX2019-000918-M-20-1

Understanding the origin of coalescing binary black holes in LIGO-Virgo from their eccentricities

The LIGO and Virgo interferometers have detected gravitational waves (GW) from several dozens of coalescing binary black hole (BBHs). Several formation channels are able to explain the BBH merger rate, leaving their origin an open question. The dynamical formation of BBHs in dense stellar systems is a promising model and it predicts that a fraction of BBHs have measurable orbital eccentricities, making this a "smoking gun" signal. Thanks to continuous improvements of GW detector sensitivity - to which the Technological Unit of the ICCUB is actively contributing - empirical constraints on BBH eccentricity are starting to arrive. You will use gravitational N-body simulations and a BBH population synthesis model to make predictions for the eccentricity distribution of BBHs that formed in all star clusters in the Universe. Then, by using Numerical Relativity techniques, you will infer eccentricities from the GW data and explore degeneracies with other binary parameters. You will join the ICCUB Virgo group, consisting of PhD students, post-docs, academics and technical staff who all share a passion for GW research. You will also join the Virgo Collaboration and work on the forefront of GW data analyses and interpretation. This project will provide valuable model predictions and test them with the wealth of GW data that is arriving as we speak to shed light on the origin of BHBs.

For more information contact Prof Mark Gieles

Requirements:

Who can apply for a grant for pre-doctoral contracts for the training of doctors 2020?

Applicants may be all those who are enrolled or admitted to a doctoral program for the 2020/2021 academic year, at the time of submission of the application. Applicants may also be all those people who, at the time of submission of the application, not being enrolled or admitted to a doctoral program, are in a position to be on the date on which the contract is formalized, in accordance with article 18

Applications must be submitted online at the URL (https://sede.micinn.gob.es/ayudaspredoctorales/) of the Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación from October 13 to October 27, 2020 at 2:00PM CET. To request the present research project please use the following reference: CEX2019-000918-M-20-1.

Employment conditions:

What is the annual gross amount of the pre-doctoral contracts?

The minimum salary compensation that researchers in training must receive will be 16,250 euros gross per year for each of the first two years, 17,410 for the third year and 21,760 for the fourth year.

What is the duration of the aid?

Four years.

More information here

ICCUB offers and promotes a diverse and inclusive environment (for additional information please see the Diversity, equity and inclusion Commission) and strongly encourages women and underrepresented minorities in physical sciences to apply.

The High Energy Astrophysics group at Universitat de Barcelona offers a PhD grant to join the group. The PhD student would gather multi-wavelength observations of galactic and/or transient sources and work on the interpretation and modelling of the data. He or she would become a member of the MAGIC Collaboration (and possibly of the CTA Consortium) and conduct observation shifts at the Canary Island of La Palma.

Our grup has experience in a multidisciplinary approach to high-energy processes in galactic and extragalactic sources with astrophysical outflows. The observational studies are conducted using forefront ground-based and satellite-born facilities such as VLA, EVN, ESO telescopes and GTC, Chandra and XMM, Agile and Fermi or MAGIC. The theoretical studies are carried out through numerical and semi-analytical modeling (radiation processes, magnetohydrodynamics).

We offer a pre-doctoral contract of up to 4 years in total funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation through the “Programa Estatal de Promoción del Talento y su Empleabilidad en I+D+I” (FPI). This position is associated to the R+D project PID2019-105510GB-C31.

Interested people should apply from 13 to 27 of October through the URL of the Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación.

Suitable candidates are those who are enrolled or admitted to a doctoral program for the 2020/2021 academic year at the time of submission of the application or that are in a position to be on the date the contract is formalized.

ICCUB offers and promotes a diverse and inclusive environment (for additional information please see the Diversity, equity and inclusion Commission) and strongly encourages women and underrepresented minorities in physical sciences to apply.

Inquiries about the scientific aspects of the contract should be addressed to jmparedes@ub.edu

The ICCUB is an interdisciplinary center with more than 60 long term scientists, 20 engineers and 80 postdoctoral researchers (55% international) and PhD students (30%international) offering an international and multicultural environment. The ICCUB also hosts a vibrant fundamental research program in cosmology, astrophysics and particle physics, with a strong technology unit supporting our participation in international collaborations in observational astronomy and experimental particle physics.

LHCb is an experiment at CERN’s Large Hadron Collider (LHC) operating since the fall of 2010. During the RUN-I and RUN-II it has taken data at √s=7 TeV (2011), √s=8 TeV (2012) and √s=13 TeV (2015-2018), showing extraordinary performance and integrating a total of 9 fb-1 of data. From the end of 2018, LHC underwent into a scheduled shutdown (LS2) and an upgraded LHCb detector will be installed and commissioned, starting the RUN-III data taking in 2021 until 2023. This phase-I upgrade will employ a 40 MHz readout with a very flexible software-based trigger, which will provide significantly increased efficiency in hadronic final states, and allow the experiment to function effectively at the higher luminosity of 2 x1033 cm-2s-1, doubling the signal efficiency of the physics channels. The upgraded detector is expected to offer the experiment the capability to trigger on new interesting signatures, such as long-lived particles, opening new physics opportunities.

The timescale of the proposed PhD thesis (2021-2025) implies the physics exploitation of the already accumulated RUN-II LHCb data, the installation, commissioning and maintenance of the phase-I upgrade detector, the operation of the detector and exploitation of RUN-III data. In addition, opportunities to participate in the R&D activities for the phase-II upgraded detector after RUN-III might as well be considered.

Requirements:

Who can apply for a grant for pre-doctoral contracts for the training of doctors 2020?

Applicants may be all those who are enrolled or admitted to a doctoral program for the 2020/2021 academic year, at the time of submission of the application. Applicants may also be all those people who, at the time of submission of the application, not being enrolled or admitted to a doctoral program, are in a position to be on the date on which the contract is formalized, in accordance with article 18.

Applications must be submitted online at the URL (https://sede.micinn.gob.es/ayudaspredoctorales/) of the Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación from October 13 to October 27, 2020 at 2:00PM CET. To request the present research project please use the following reference: PID2019-106448GB-C31.

Employment conditions:

What is the annual gross amount of the pre-doctoral contracts?

The minimum salary compensation that researchers in training must receive will be 16,250 euros gross per year for each of the first two years, 17,410 for the third year and 21,760 for the fourth year.

What is the duration of the aid?

Four years.

More information here

ICCUB offers and promotes a diverse and inclusive environment (for additional information please see the Diversity, equity and inclusion Commission) and strongly encourages women and underrepresented minorities in physical sciences to apply.

“La Caixa” Foundation is launching a postdoctoral fellowships program in which candidates will be able to conduct a research project at accredited centres with the Severo Ochoa or María de Maeztu excellence award, Institutos de Investigación Sanitaria Carlos IIII and units evaluated as excellent by the Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia of Portugal.

Description of our Institute:

The Institute of Cosmos Sciences of the University of Barcelona (ICCUB) is an interdisciplinary center devoted to fundamental research in the fields of cosmology, astrophysics and particle physics. In addition, the Institute has a strong technology program through its participation in international collaborations in observational astronomy and experimental particle physics.

The ICCUB has been awarded the Maria de Maeztu distinction which recognizes our leadership and research impact. Our main lines of research, as well as the associated faculty members, can be found here: http://icc.ub.edu/research/research_areas

The ICCUB is concerned about the under representation of women, as well as other underrepresented minorities in the fields of sciences of the cosmos, and therefore strongly encourages their application.

The Postdoctoral Junior Leader fellowships programme is aimed at hiring excellent researchers, of any nationality, who wish to continue their research career in Spain or Portugal in the STEM area (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics). The objectives of this programme are to foster high-quality, innovative research in Spain and Portugal and to support the best scientific talent by providing them with an attractive, competitive environment in which to conduct excellent research.

The Postdoctoral Junior Leader fellowships programme is divided into two different frames, to conduct your research project at the Institute you must apply to the Incoming program:

• Postdoctorate Junior Leader – Incoming: 30 postdoctoral fellowships for researchers of all nationalities. They will be offered a three-year employment contract to conduct a research project at accredited centres with the Severo Ochoa or María de Maeztu excellence award, Institutos de Investigación Sanitaria Carlos IIII and units evaluated as excellent by the Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia of Portugal.
  For Spanish institutions, candidates must have resided in Spain less than 12 months in the last three years while for Portuguese institutions, candidates must have resided in Portugal less than 12 months in the last three years.

This frame is co-funded by the European Commission within the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions scheme of Horizon2020.

Requirements:

Researchers of any nationality are eligible for the Postdoctoral Junior Leader fellowships programme. In order to get accepted, candidates must meet the following requirements:

• Experience: They should have earned their doctoral degree two to seven years prior to the deadline of the call for applications. The date of the doctoral thesis defence will be understood as the date when the doctoral degree was obtained. In the cases of interruption of the research activity between the date of obtaining the doctoral degree and the call deadline, the candidate may request an extension of the period in which the doctoral degree must have been obtained.
  

• Geographic mobility:
  For candidates applying to Spanish centres or units: Candidates must not have resided or have carried out their main activity (work, studies, etc.) in Spain for more than twelve months in the three years immediately preceding the closing date of the call. Short stays, such as holidays, will not be taken into account.
  

  For candidates applying to Portuguese units: Candidates must not have resided or have carried out their main activity (work, studies, etc.) in Portugal for more than twelve months in the three years immediately preceding the closing date of the call. Short stays, such as holidays, will not be taken into account.

  Special mobility condition could apply for the in the cases of interruption of the research activity or researchers who have spent time in the procedure for obtaining the refugee status under the Geneva Convention.
  

• Complete applications: Only candidates whose applications meet all the requirements of the call may be accepted.

Application: ”la Caixa” fellowship application website

The Qilimanjaro Quantum Tech SL startup company is looking for candidates to join a team of quantum scientists and quantum engineers to build and operate one of the first generations of commercial European quantum processors.

Open position

Quantum Engineer in electronics for superconducting qubits.

We offer a young scientist position holding a master's degree or equivalent to join the experimental team at Qilimanjaro.

Requirements:

-Master's degree or equivalent in Quantum Physics, Electronics engineering or equivalent.

-Candidates with experience in the following areas will be particularly considered: knowledge in quantum information and superconducting qubits in particular, programming skills, electronic circuits design of DC and RF circuits.

Position description

Main tasks: Scalable electronics for qubit control. Low frequency and high frequency electronics development. Circuit simulation, design, and implementation. Integration with superconducting qubit experiments.

This young scientist position is a unique opportunity to become a trained researcher in the field of quantum computation and the emerging quantum industry. This position is targeted at highly motivated researchers who are willing to join a diverse, international environment with strong overlaps between experimental and theoretical physics and engineering.

Young scientist positions may be combined with a PhD degree in one of the local universities in Barcelona (University of Barcelona[UB], Autonomous University of Barcelona [UAB], Polytechnical University ofCatalonia [UPC]). Registration costs to the PhD program will be included in the contract.

The position will be carried out between the Qilimanjaro laboratory headquarters in the Barcelona area and the electronics department of the University of Barcelona, as well as Qilimanjaro’s remote sites.

Qilimanjaro Quantum Tech is an inclusive company and an equal opportunity employer. No discrimination will be made on the basis of race, religion, color, nationalorigin, gender, sexual orientation, age, marital status, or disability status.

Interested applicants may submit a letter of intent to qilimanjaro@qilimanjaro.tech

Details of the positions

Desired requirements

Applicants are expected to have a doctoral degree in Physics, Computer Science, Mathematics, or are lated discipline before the starting date of the position, and have previous expertise in one (or more) of the following areas: quantum computation, quantum information, tensor networks,machine learning, quantum many-body systems, condensed matter physics, quantum field theory. Applicants should have a strong interest in solving challenging problems, as well as a proven recor dof research, including publication of original work in at least one of the above areas. Excellent scientific writing ability and good communication skills are essential.

How to apply

Applications should be sent to Dr. Sofyan Iblisdir and should include: 1) a motivation letter;2) a curriculum vitae including a list of publications; 3) a research statement; 4) the name and email of two references. For full consideration, applications should be submitted by the 10th of March 2020.

Please direct informal enquiries to:

Dr Sofyan Iblisdir: sofyan.iblisdir@fqa.ub.edu

Dr Luca Tagliacozzo: luca.tagliacozzo@fqa.ub.edu

All qualified applicants will receive equal consideration without regard to appearance, beliefs, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability or age.

Description

The Institute of Cosmos Sciences of the University of Barcelona (http://icc.ub.edu) is an interdisciplinary center devoted to fundamental research in the fields of cosmology, astrophysics and particle physics.

The person hired will join the Electronics & Instrumentation department of The Technological Unit of ICCUB. Currently, the unit is composed by a team of around 20 engineers and researchers divided in two departments, Electronics & Instrumentation and Software and Data Engineering. The Electronics & Instrumentation department develops electronics instrumentation for international scientific collaborations. Some examples of the projects the department is involved: the LHCb experiment at the CERN synchrotron (http://lhcb.web.cern.ch/lhcb/), the Cherenkov telescope array, CTA, (https://www.cta-observatory.org/) or the gravitational wave observatory, Virgo (http://www.virgo-gw.eu/).

• Responsabilities

We search for highly motivated Electronics or Telecommunications Engineer with demonstrated experience of 3 years in software and firmware development. We offer a full-time contract starting as soon as possible for a period of 1 year (with 6 months of trial period), possibilities to continue after are opened. The salary will be according to the experience of the candidate.

The working place will be based at the ICCUB facilities (Technological Unit of the ICCUB at Parc Cientific de Barcelona).

The main tasks to develop are:

• Firmware development for control systems and data acquisition on FPGAs. Knowledge on VHDL or Verilog.

• C++ software development for control and data acquisition through USB or Ethernet.

• User interface development.

• Lab instrumentation control through SCPI and automatized test system

implementation.

• System integration.

• Technical documentation development.

• Required Technical Expertise

• C++

• VHDL or Verilog

• Threads

• Sockets

• SO: Linux and Windows 7/10

• FPGAs

• Quartus Prime

• PCB Debug

• Git

• TCP/IP

• SPI/I2C

• Preferred Technical Expertise

• GCC toolchain

• QT

• GUIs

• PCB design

• Cadence Virtuoso / Innovus

• Language requirements

English: fluid speaking, reading and writing

CONTACT AND DEADLINE

Applicants must send an email to Dr. Joan Mauricio (jmauricio@fqa.ub.edu) with the Curriculum

Vitae (CV) in free format plus a motivation letter. The selection process, according to the number

of applicants, will consist of curricular pre-selection.

Applications will be accepted until the position is filled.

“La Caixa” Foundation is launching a postdoctoral fellowships program in which candidates will be able to come to an institution or center evaluated as excellent (distinguished with either the Maria de Maeztu award, the Severo Ochoa award, or an Investigación Sanitaria Carlos III institute) among them, the Institute of Cosmos Sciences.

Description of our Institute:

The Institute of Cosmos Sciences of the University of Barcelona (ICCUB) is an interdisciplinary center devoted to fundamental research in the fields of cosmology, astrophysics and particle physics. In addition, the Institute has a strong technology program through its participation in international collaborations in observational astronomy and experimental particle physics.

The ICCUB was awarded the Maria de Maeztu distinction which recognizes our leadership and research impact. Our main lines of research, as well as the associated faculty members, can be found here: http://icc.ub.edu/research/research_areas

Description of the fellowship:

Researchers in the Junior Leader “la Caixa” program will have a three-year contract in accordance with employment legislation in force in Spain, pursuant to provisions regarding occupational health and safety and social security, with access to suitable resources, equipment and facilities.

The incorporation date will be between April 1 to September 30, 2020.

Salary: please refer to this document.

Requirements for candidates:

Researchers of any nationality are eligible for the Junior Leader program. In order to be accepted, candidates must meet the following requirements:

·Experience: They should have earned their doctoral degree two to seven years prior to the deadline for applications. The date of the doctoral thesis defense will be understood to be the date when the doctoral degree was obtained.

·Geographic mobility: Candidates must not have resided or carried out their main activity (work, studies, etc.) in Spain for more than 12 months in the 3 years immediately prior to the call deadline. Short stays such as holidays will not be taken into account.

For more information about the call please refer tothis document.

Applications:

All applications must be completed online in this link

However, we ask interested candidates to let us know of their interest directly by contacting the faculty member whose research is closest to theirs.

The ICCUB is concerned about the under representation of women in the fields of sciences of the cosmos, and therefore strongly encourages young women to apply.

The research activity will be developed in collaboration with one of the ICCUB research groups, and will be finished with a presentation and defense of a Master Thesis.

1. Missió:

Donar suport a la Secretaria Científica i l'equip de divulgació en la difusió de les activitats de l'ICCUB i gestió de continguts d'una nova pàgina web de divulgació.

2. Funcions genèriques:

• Organitzar, fer difusió i participar ocasionalment en les activitats divulgatives de l'ICCUB
• Editar continguts a la web de divulgació http://serviastro.am.ub.edu/twiki/bin/view/ServiAstro/

3. Requisits:

• Dinamisme i iniciativa en la resolució de problemes
• Capacitat d'organització i de priorització de tasques
• Nivell d'anglès suficient per poder-se comunicar correctament a nivell oral i per correu
• Informàtica a nivell d'usuari: Office, navegació web i correu electrònic.

4. Mèrits addicionals

• Coneixements en l'elaboració de pàgines web i gestors de continguts
• Coneixements en editors gràfics
• Coneixements en bases de dades
• Estudis i Formació: llicenciat, diplomat o estudis de grau, preferentment el Grau de Física
• Experiència en l'àmbit de divulgació científica
• Màster en comunicació/divulgació científica

5. Condicions de l'oferta

Jornada laboral: 26 hores setmanals

Sou brut mensual: 940€ aproximadament

Tipus de contracte: Obra i Servei

Durada del contracte: del 15 de setembre fins el 31 d'octubre.

Si esteu interessats en l'oferta, podeu enviar una carta d'interès i un CV a secretaria@icc.ub.edu.

(Spanish below)

Contratos de investigación, verano 2019

El grupo Gaia (https://gaia.ub.edu/) del Institut de Ciències del Cosmos, Institut d'Estudis Espacials de Catalunya, convoca DOS contratos de investigación para los meses de julio a septiembre. Estos contratos están dirigidos a:

(A) alumnos de los últimos cursos del grado de Física o doble titulación de Física - Matemáticas, que hayan cursado la asignatura Astronomía Observacional o que puedan acreditar conocimientos equivalentes.

(B) alumnos de los últimos cursos de Ingeniera (preferentemente Informática o Telecomunicaciones) o Matemáticas.

Se valoraran conocimientos de programación y capacidad de trabajo autónomo.

Durante el período de contrato se desarrollará un proyecto de investigación relacionado con los temas de investigación del grupo. El grupo Gaia está involucrado en la misión espacial del mismo nombre que está midiendo las posiciones, movimientos, paralajes y propiedades físicas de mil millones de estrellas de nuestra Galaxia. Se lanzó en diciembre de 2013, lleva ya cinco años en fase operacional y ha publicado dos catálogos (Gaia Data Releases DR1 y DR2). Los proyectos a desarrollar están relacionados con la explotación de estos datos tanto desde un punto de vista científico como tecnológico, y eventualmente dando soporte a los sistemas de procesado de datos en el BSC-MareNostrum.

La remuneración es de 700 euros brutos mensuales.

Las personas interesadas tienen que enviar un curriculum, una copia del expediente académico y una carta expresando su interés a Lola Balaguer lbalaguer@fqa.ub.edu antes del 31 de mayo de 2019. La concesión se resolverá el 15 de junio de 2019.

The ICCUB is offering 16 PhD projects within INPhINIT program of "la Caixa" Foundation. INPhINIT will select 35 young researchers of all nationalities for a three year program to complete a PhD in one of the centers that has received a distictive Severo Ochoa or Maria de Maeztu award.

Requirements for candidates:

• In order to be accepted, candidates must meet the following eligibility requirements:

  • Experience: At the call deadline, applicants must be in the first four years (full-time equivalent research experience) of their research careers and not yet have been awarded a doctoral degree.

  • Studies pursued: At the time of recruitment, candidates must comply with one of the following options:

    - To have completed the studies that lead to an official university degree adapted to the European Higher Education Area awarding 300 ECTS credits, of which at least 60 ECTS credits must correspond to master level.

    - To have completed a degree in university not adapted to the European Higher Education Area that gives access to doctoral studies. The verification of an equivalent level of studies to the ones mentioned above will be made by the university when the admission procedure starts.

  • Geographic mobility:
    For candidates applying to Spanish centres or units: Candidates must not have resided or have carried out their main activity (work, studies, etc.) in Spain for more than 12 months in the 3 years immediately prior to the call deadline.

    For candidates applying to Portuguese centres or units: Candidates must not have resided or have carried out their main activity (work, studies, etc.) in Portugal for more than 12 months in the 3 years immediately prior to the call deadline.

    Short stays, such as holidays, done in a country other than their country of usual residence (where they carried out their main activity), will be considered as time spent in their country of usual residence.

  • Level of English: Candidates must have a demonstrable level of English (B2 or higher).

  • Complete applications: Only candidates whose applications meet all the requirements of the call may be accepted.

More information about requirements

The projects offered by ICCUB are:

• Active Galactic Nuclei in Merging Galaxies: A theoretical Approach[+]

  Group Leader: Josep Maria Solanes Majúa

  http://icc.ub.edu/people/68

  Research Project Description

  Supermassive black holes (SMBH) have been detected in the centers of most nearby large galaxies. Galaxies today are not only the products of billions of years of ierarchical structure build up, but also billions of years of SMBH activity as active galactic nuclei (AGN) are thought to be the generic outcome of galaxy-galaxy mergers. In this context, detection of AGN pairs should be relatively common. Observationally, however, dual AGNs are scant, being just a few percent of all AGNs. In this PhD thesis, the candidate will investigate the triggering of AGN activity in merging galaxies via a suite of high-resolution hydrodynamical simulations. (S)He will follow the dynamics of the mergers and trace all processes related to star formation and the accretion of baryons onto the SMBHs, exploring AGN activity across a wide range of relevant conditions and testing when the two AGNs are simultaneously active and for how long. One of the main goals is to derive constraints for the dual AGN fraction detectable through imaging and spectroscopy.

  This thesis is part of a joint research project which involves researchers from the ICCUB and from the Instituto de Astrofísica de Andalucía (IAA) and the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias (IAC), both Severo Ochoa Centers of Excellence. This partnership, has been awarded funding by the Spanish Programa Estatal de Fomento de la Investigación Científica y Técnica de Excelencia over the period 2017-19. ICCUB’s contribution to this project mainly lies in using state-of-the-art computer simulations of galaxy interactions and mergers to capture much of the important physics of the processes involved on timescales affordable to study, thus providing a valid reference against which to compare observational data. In short, we are offering the opportunity to participate in a multidisciplinary endeavor that will allow students to acquire advanced academic training in diverse fields, from theoretical astrophysics to high-performance computing.

  Job Position Description

  The PhD candidate should start by familiarizing with the numerical tools and high-resolution collisionless simulations developed by our group, and then contribute to the implementation of the hydrodynamic modeling of the astrophysical dissipative processes related to the gas cooling, star formation, and feedback in galaxies that have a direct bearing on the feeding of their central SMBHs during a merger. (S)He will then perform and analyze a massive suite of numerical simulations of binary galaxy mergers, focusing on the separations and timescales characterizing dual AGN activity. On a later stage, the candidate is also expected to contribute to the extension of the implementation of the evolutionary equations for baryons to forming galaxy groups, in which galaxies experience multiple collisions and mergers with other group companions, as well as strong interactions with the intragroup environment. The goal of this phase would be to build on the knowledge of the formation scenario of first-ranked objects in galaxy aggregations.

  In order to succeed in his/her task, the candidate will have to deal in a totally self-consistent manner with numerical simulations that combine dark, stellar and multiphase gaseous components, and that have a high enough resolution to minimize the effects linked to the two-body heating, angular momentum loses and alterations of the radiative cooling efficiency. In this context, it is worth noting that our group owns a large parallel supercomputer with 40 CPUs and has preferential access to the massive computing infrastructures of the IAA and IAC, where the PhD student will also be expected to carry part of his/her work. This allows us to guarantee that at all times there will be enough computing power available to perform the numerical simulations required by the thesis.

  Individuals with good analytical/research skills and interested in acquiring a high degree of computer literacy are encouraged to apply.

• A numerical and semi-analytical approach to study the radiation from powerful astrophysical outflows[+]

  Group Leader: Valentí Bosch-Ramon

  http://icc.ub.edu/people/178

  Research Project Description

  Understanding the astrophysical sources producing ultra-relativistic particles and energetic radiation requires the characterization of the underlying physics, which typically involves complex fluid dynamics, particle acceleration, and radiation processes. This characterization has traditionally relied on models based on strong simplifying assumptions on the emitting region. The recent great improvement in observational instrumentation has slowly pushed the field towards more complex theoretical models, and now it is time to work on fluid dynamics accounting for the production of ultra-relativistic particles and their radiation.

  The project is focused on: (i) getting familiar with semi-analytical modelling of nonthermal emission (ii) working with relativistic magnetohydrodynamical codes to include the presence of very energetic particles and their emission; (iii) application of these tools to powerful galactic and extragalactic sources that feature interaction structures (binary systems, active galactic nucleus jets, etc.) that are expected to strongly radiate gamma rays and lower energy emission; (iv) to compare the accurate computational results with observations of these sources.

  The research group is oriented towards the theoretical modeling of very energetic sources in the Universe. The group leader, Dr. V. Bosch-Ramon, has been working for many years on galactic and extragalactic sources, and has a long experience and knowledge of techniques applied to model these objects. The research group is embedded in a worldly recognized group (part of MAGIC and CTA: VHE instrumentation), led by Prof. J. M. Paredes; the group also hosts other prominent senior scientists, with decades of experience in multi-wavelength observations from radio to gamma rays: the perfect context to plan observations to provide the theoretical research with observational feedback. The research will be carried out in the framework of a powerful international net of collaborators all over the world.

  Job Position Description

  The job position requires some modest experience with structured programming. At least basic understanding of special relativity and fluid dynamics is important. A working knowledge of English is also needed. It is also important to be open to attend conferences and carry out research stays abroad. Finally, what is mostly needed is motivation for solving interesting, but surmountable, physical problems, to work hard, and to learn team work, as well as analytical and synthesis skills.

  There is an important multi-disciplinary element in the job position, as it links basic physics disciplines with applied astrophysics, i.e fluid dynamics in extreme conditions, modeling of radiation from astrophysical sources, and interpretation of observations and planning for prediction testing.

  The doctorate schedule may be organized as follows:

  • The doctoral fellow will develop semi-analytical models and extensions of powerful codes for relativistic magnetohydrodynamics. These extensions will take into account the generation, transport and energy evolution of ultra-relativistic particles in the simulated flow. This tool will permit sound and consistent modeling of powerful and complex sources, not well understood yet. In parallel, the fellow will become familiar with relativistic hydrodynamics, and non-thermal processes. This task would last up to the end of the first half of the PhD.
  • The fellow will apply the developed tools to hot topics in high-energy astrophysics, like gamma-ray production in galactic systems and in extragalactic jets. In parallel, the fellow will become familiar with the observations carried out to study these sources in the whole electromagnetic spectrum. This task would start towards the end of the first year.
  • The fellow may take part in observational campaigns to observe the modeled sources,and participate in the proposal stage as well as in the interpretation of the results.This activity could take place during the second half of the doctoral period.
• Front End electronics for medical imaging and particle detection[+]

  Group Leader: David Gascón

  http://icc.ub.edu/people/30

  Research Project Description

  The experimental particle physics (EHEP) research team in the Institute of Cosmos Science in the University of Barcelona (ICCUB) has contributed to heavy flavour experiments during the last 17 years. During this time, the group has developed a significant expertise in the design, manufacturing and operation of custom electronics and microelectronics for the readout of photo-detectors and data processing in other disciplines, such as astrophysics, space or medical imaging.

  The technology developed for the particle physics experiments has been proved to be disruptive for Positron Emission Tomography (PET) in the medical imaging field. Current full-body PET scanners can achieve a 300-ps FWHM Coincidence Time Resolution (CTR) and nowadays the best results found so far could be near 200ps, which can be translated into 3cm spacing resolution. The dream in PET scanners could be to reach the 10ps CTR, i.e., a spatial resolution of 1.5 mm. This 10-fold increase in sensitivity will translate in the reduction of radiation dose, scan time, and cost by an order of magnitude. One way to get closer to the 10-ps CTR is to employ very deep submicron (VDSM) technologies (below 65nm) to develop ultra-fast readout electronics. However, these VDSM processes pose challenges, in particular to the analog front-end (FE) design.

  The main research activities will be:

  • Study different VDSM CMOS technologies and select the most appropriate in terms of performances and cost.
  • Novel topologies for high speed preamplifiers (>1GHz) with ultra-low power consumption (< 200 µW) and very low parallel noise (<< 10 pA/sqrt(Hz)).
  • New architectures for on-chip signal processing: shaping, discrimination, interconnection and parallel processing.

  The benefits of such electronics are not limited to medical imaging. It will open a new era in Light Detection and Ranging (LIDAR) or in particle detectors where precise time detection could be critical in future experiments in the LHC at CERN.

  Job Position Description

  The candidate will join the group as a fellow researcher in the Integrated Circuit (IC) design field. This position will focus on developing a new analog FE architecture to overcome the limitations of the current PET technology. The main objective of this project will be the design of a high-density, low power and large dynamic range Application Specific Integrated Circuit (ASIC) for the readout of photo-sensors, specially, Silicon Photomultipliers (SiPMs). The electronics will be also applied to future high luminosity colliders, where ps time resolution is required for time tagging of particle interactions and also for LIDAR applications.

  She/he will participate in all phases of IC design flow (design, simulation, layout and verification) and characterization of the front-end electronics in lab test benches, particle detectors and hospitals. The candidate will work in a multidisciplinary environment involving also scientists and international researchers. Lastly, the candidate will work in collaboration with other research groups from CERN and from CIEMAT (Centro de Investigaciones Energéticas, Medioambientales y Tecnológicas) and thus learning from high experience engineers.

  The requisites of the candidate are knowledge and experience in:

  • Engineering degree or similar (preferably Electronics Engineer)
  • IC design (schematic, simulation, layout and verification)

  It would also be desirable to have knowledge in:

  • IC testing, PCB design and layout and SW development
  • Data analysis for IC verification and characterization
  • Medical imaging
  • Radiation detectors/li>
• Time to Digital converters for fast readout electronics[+]

  Group Leader: Joan Mauricio Ferré

  http://icc.ub.edu/people/326

  Research Project Description

  The experimental particle physics (EHEP) research team in the Universitat de Barcelona has contributed to heavy flavour experiments during the last 17 years. During this time, the group has developed a significant expertise in the design, manufacturing and operation of custom electronics and microelectronics for the readout of photo-detectors and data processing in other disciplines, such as astrophysics, space or medical imaging.

  Positron Emission Tomography (PET) is a diagnosis technique that employs a small quantity of a radioactive substance to obtain molecular images of a living organism by measuring the Time-of-Flight of photons produced by electron-positron annihilation. Commercial full-body PET scanners currently achieve a Coincidence Time Resolution (CTR) of around 300 ps FWHM, i.e., 7.5 cm. Although, there is a lot of effort in decreasing this number, nowadays the best values are around 200 ps, i.e, 3 cm. One of the main challenges in medical imaging is to develop improved readout electronics to get a bit closer to the single photon time stamping at the level of 10ps FWHM, i.e., 1.5 mm intrinsic position uncertainty, which could open the way to paradigm shifts in medical imaging applications.

  A PET system is composed by scintillators, photo-detectors, front-end electronics and back-end electronics to ease the data processing. Front electronics require a fast response to capture precisely the arrival time and energy of the photons generated by a gamma source. The front-end electronics must provide time and energy information into a binary pulse, but this information must still be converted into a digital representation of the time they occurred. Time to Digital Converters (TDCs) are traditionally used for this purpose. In that sense, readout electronics should be designed using very deep submicron (VDSM) technologies (down to 28 nm) to develop ultra-fast TDCs. However, these VDSM processes pose challenges, for instance, in terms of process variations.

  Job Position Description

  The candidate will join the group as a fellow researcher in the Integrated Circuit (IC) design field. This position will focus on developing the back-end electronics, i.e., the TDC, for the electronics of a PET system. The objective is to develop a high density TDCs, including 64 readout channels, with a time stamp with a resolution lower than 10ps and decreasing drastically the power consumption up to 1mW per readout channel. This big decrease in power consumption could be achieve, partially, by employing deep submicron technologies, 65nm and below. The candidate will need to tackle the problems of these technologies, such as process variations which directly translate into performance degradation if the layout is not designed properly. Another challenge will be to integrate the back-end electronics with the front-end electronics into a single chip in to increase the level of integration. Lastly, The TDC could be also applied to future high luminosity colliders, where picosecond time resolution is required for time tagging of particle interactions or other applications such as LIDAR.

  She/he will participate in all phases of IC design flow (design, simulation, layout and verification) and characterization of the modules in lab test benches and particle detectors. The candidate will work in a multidisciplinary environment involving also scientists and international researchers.

  The requisites of the candidate are knowledge and experience in:

  • Engineering degree or similar (preferably Electronics Engineer).
  • IC design (schematic, simulation, layout, verification and physical synthesis).

  It would also be desirable to have knowledge in:

  • IC testing, PCB design and layout and SW development.
  • Data analysis for IC verification and characterization.
  • Medical imaging.
• Exploiting clustering on small (-ish) cosmological scales/PhD Student[+]

  Group Leader: Licia Verde

  http://icc.ub.edu/people/99

  Research Project Description

  The Physical Cosmology group (icc.ub.edu/~liciaverde/ICC-Phys.Cosm.html) has been working in Cosmology, connecting theory with observations via interpretation of data since 2007. Our main research interest is making the connection between cosmological observations and the physics behind the standard cosmological model, hoping to shed some light on the “open questions” in cosmology: what is dark matter, what is dark energy? What are the neutrino properties? Is there new physics beyond the standard model for cosmology (which members of the group have actively contributed to establish some 15 years ago or so). Our collective expertise ranges from galaxy evolution to inflation model building but our main strengths are in analysis and interpretation of large-scale structure surveys. Members of the groups are involved in the DESI survey and the Euclid consortium. These are highly international collaborations. In particular the DESI survey is expected to produce data on a timescale shorter than the studentship offering a unique opportunity to exploit these data. We have tight collaborations also with several groups abroad including in Italy, France and UK. In 2018-2019 the group will be composed of two Faculty, one postdoc fellow, three postdocs, and five graduate students, offering a diverse and vibrant learning and research environment.

  Job Position Description

  The current understanding of the Universe is incomplete. According to the standard cosmological model, its dynamics are governed by two components, dark matter and dark energy, for which we only have indirect evidence and fragmentary theoretical comprehension. Unveiling the nature of this dark sector likely requires either a modification in the standard description of fields and particles or an advancement in our understanding of space and time (by modifying Einstein's General Relativity).

  Next-generation galaxy surveys, such as DESI and Euclid, will play a crucial role in disentangling these two competing scenarios. Together with existing low redshift dataset, these new surveys will provide us with an unprecedented amount of 3-dimensional galaxy clustering information and growth of primordial cosmological perturbations under gravity. The combination of these two probes is key in addressing the big open puzzles introduced above.

  Next-generation surveys aim at an order of magnitude improvement on current cosmological constraints coming from these two key measurements, but, for this to be possible, we have to face a number of challenges. Chief among them is modelling non-linearities in an accurate yet fast way. We envision that a combination of analytical and numerical approaches will be needed, in particular on the modelling of the so-called redshift space distortions. A potentially powerful model was originally introduced by members of this group and there is ample room for further developments.

  You will be working with the group on advanced modelling of non-linear scales from both a theoretical and numerical point of view. The results will be a key step in understanding the unprecedented amount of cosmological information that next-generation survey, such as DESI and Euclid, will deliver.

• The blind watchers of the sky[+]

  Group Leader: Licia Verde

  http://icc.ub.edu/people/99

  Research Project Description

  The Physical Cosmology group has been working in Cosmology, connectng theory with observatons via interpretaton of data since 2007. Our main research interest is making the connecton between cosmological observatons and the physics behind the standard cosmological model, hoping to shed some light on the “open questons” in cosmology: what is dark mater, what is dark energy? What are the neutrino propertes? Is there new physics beyond the standard model for cosmology (which members of the group have actvely contributed to establish some 15 years ago). Our collectve expertse ranges from galaxy evoluton to infaton model building but our main strengths are in analysis and interpretaton of large-scale structure surveys. Members of the groups are involved in the DESI survey and the Euclid consortum. These are highly internatonal collaboratons. In partcular the DESI survey is expected to produce data on a tmescale shorter than the studentship ofering a unique opportunity to exploit these data. We have tght collaboratons also with several groups abroad including in Italy, France and UK.

  In 2018-2019 the group will be composed of two Faculty, one postdoc fellow, three postdocs, and fve graduate students, ofering a diverse and vibrant learning and research environment.

  Job Position Description

  This project is oriented in develop blinding techniques for the upcoming cosmology surveys, with special emphasis in DESI and Euclid. Since the major science results from these surveys (e.g., determinaton of neutrino masses, informaton on the mass hierarchy, nature of dark mater, nature of dark energy) have profound implicatons for Fundamental physics, beyond cosmology, the same rigorous standards employed e.g. in partcle physics must now also be applied in Cosmology.

  Blinding is a well developed technique in science and in partcular in partcle physics whereby informaton about the test or measurement is masked (kept) from the experimenter, to reduce or eliminate bias, untl afer a trial outcome is known. Its applicaton is wide even beyond physics, for example it is used extensively in medical trials. Blinding has not really been implemented much in cosmology untl very recently and it has not been applied in the analysis of galaxy surveys. But in the era of accurate and precise cosmology it must become a priority for all ongoing and future surveys. Implementng blinding in galaxy surveys analysis opens up a whole new series of challenges which must be addressed to ensure high quality of the scientfc results. Having not only precise and accurate measurements, but also unafected by the prior cosmological analises, is one of the key aspects of to ensure that the fundamental questons that these projects can be answered, and can be directly imported into the other felds they can impact (fundamental physics, partcle physics etc.). You will work with the group and the DESI team on addressing these challenges and on developing and implementng a blinding strategy for DESI. This will be a critcal item in the path to ensure success and recogniton of the experiment.

• Cosmology with massive galaxy large scale structure surveys[+]

  Group Leader: Licia Verde

  http://icc.ub.edu/people/99

  Research Project Description

  The Physical Cosmology group has been working in Cosmology, connectng theory with observatons via interpretaton of data since 2007. Our main research interest is making the connecton between cosmological observatons and the physics behind the standard cosmological model, hoping to shed some light on the “open questons” in cosmology: what is dark mater, what is dark energy? What are the neutrino propertes? Is there new physics beyond the standard model for cosmology (which members of the group have actvely contributed to establish some 15 years ago). Our collectve expertse ranges from galaxy evoluton to infaton model building but our main strengths are in analysis and interpretaton of large-scale structure surveys. Members of the groups are involved in the DESI survey and the Euclid consortum. These are highly internatonal collaboratons. In partcular the DESI survey is expected to produce data on a tmescale shorter than the studentship ofering a unique opportunity to exploit these data. We have tght collaboratons also with several groups abroad including in Italy, France and UK.

  In 2018-2019 the group will be composed of two Faculty, one postdoc fellow, three postdocs, and fve graduate students, ofering a diverse and vibrant learning and research environment.

  Job Position Description

  This project aims to study the content of the Universe, its nature and laws through the large scale structure (LSS) of the Universe.

  One of the most outstanding breakthroughs in the recent history of physics has been the discovery of the accelerated expansion of the Universe, initally via observatons of Type Ia SNe, which was awarded with the Nobel Prize of Physics in 2011. Within General Relatvity, such accelerated expansion can only be included through a positve value of the cosmological constant, which counterstrike force of gravity. Such cosmological constant could be understood as the presence of an exotc form of energy associated to the quantum vacuum, which is usually referred as Dark Energy. Within this framework, the current state-of-the-art observatons suggest that only the 4% of the energy-density content of the Universe is made of partcles we understand at fundamental level, whereas the remaining 96% seems to be dominated by exotc forms of mater and energy we are just startng to classify and characterize. What makes up 96% of the Universe? These are the biggest open questons in the feld, and some of the biggest open questons in physics today. In this project you will address such big open questons through the LSS of the Universe, and in partcular with the future massive galaxy surveys, the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI) and EUCLID. This project focuses on how to maximize the scientfc outcome LSS data that these DESI and EUCLID will deliver. In partcular you will focus on, i) to compress and optmize the amount of informaton that we can extract from observatons or experiments, ii) to use higher order-functons to increase the informaton return from these experiments, iii) to develop new techniques to control and correct the systematcs that otherwise would limit the promised precision of these experiments, vi) to study ways of improving robustness of interpretaton of cosmological results and its wider implicatons.

• Fundamental Physics from the Sky[+]

  Group Leader: Raul Jimenez

  http://icc.ub.edu/people/98

  Research Project Description

  The Physical Cosmology group (icc.ub.edu/~liciaverde/ICC-Phys.Cosm.html) has been working in Cosmology, connecting theory with observations via interpretation of data since 2007. Our main research interest is making the connection between cosmological observations and the physics behind the standard cosmological model, hoping to shed some light on the “open questions” in cosmology: what is dark matter, what is dark energy? What are the neutrino properties? Is there new physics beyond the standard model for cosmology (which members of the group have actively contributed to establish some 15 years ago or so). Ofur collective expertise ranges from galaxy evolution to inflation model building but our main strengths are in analysis and interpretation of large-scale structure surveys. Members of the groups are involved in the DESI survey and the Euclid consortium. These are highly international collaborations. In particular the DESI survey is expected to produce data on a timescale shorter than the studentship offering a unique opportunity to exploit these data. We have tight collaborations also with several groups abroad including in Italy, France and UK. In 2018-2019 the group will be composed of two Faculty, one postdoc fellow, three postdocs, and five graduate students, offering a diverse and vibrant learning and research environment.

  Job Position Description

  The avalanche of data that current astronomical surveys are bringing, allow for precise exploration of the fundamental laws of physics. What was the origin of the early Universe? How did the Universe evolve to our current state? What is Dark energy? Are there extra-dimensions? Is the Universe homogeneous? What lies beyond the current visible horizon? Many of these questions can be answered by a detailed study of data from the sky and a careful theoretical analysis. This projects lies at the most exciting frontier of knowledge currently: cosmology; it will provide the PhD student with a golden opportunity to exploit the golden trove data that is arriving from telescopes worldwide to unveil fundamental laws of nature. The project aims at using data from current and upcoming cosmological surveys like DESI and EUCLID to explore the above frontier of human knowledge. In particular the student will develop tests and make predictions that can shed light into new physics by exploiting observations of the large scale structure of the sky. In this way, the project will seek to unveil what physics beyond the current LCDM paradigm is there, if any.

• Star formation in the Cosmological Context.[+]

  Group Leader:

  http://icc.ub.edu/people/103

  Research Project Description

  Star formation is a crucial process in Cosmology, to understand the re-ionization of the universe and the origin and evolution of galaxies. This PhD project tackle star formation by addressing fundamental questions of its role in the cosmological context: What physical processes control the distribution of stellar masses and the formation rate of stars and how do they change with cosmic time? What was the contribution of the very first stars to the re-ionization of the universe? Do globular clusters probe the early merging activities of mini halos in the standard cold-dark-matter model of the universe?

  The research project consists of developing state-of-the-art computational models, focusing on two key contexts: 1) Magneto-hydrodynamic, cosmological simulations of the first dark-matter halos to collapse and form stars, to study the origin of Population III stars and their possible role in the re-ionization of the universe; 2) Simulations of the collision and merging of mini halos at high redshift, to investigate their possible role in the origin of globular clusters.

  These are challenging multi-scale and multi-physics computational problems, requiring state-of-the-art massively parallel codes and large supercomputing allocations. The development of numerical codes is an important part of this project, which is carried out in close collaboration with the computational astrophysics group at the University of Copenhagen. The group in Barcelona will be composed by Prof. Padoan (group leader), Dr. Frimann, the PhD student, and long-term visitors from the University of Copenhagen. The main collaborators in Copenhagen will be Prof. Nordlund, Prof. Haugbølle. We have a proven track record in the field of computational astrophysics, leading the most challenging supercomputing applications in supersonic turbulence, star formation, solar physics, and plasma physics. We are regularly awarded some of the largest allocations in supercomputing facilities in the USA and Europe.

  Job Position Description

  The PhD student who aspires to lead this project will have a keen interest in fundamental astrophysical processes, a demonstrated aptitude for the development and adoption of numerical codes, and a steadfast determination to become a world leader in the field of star formation, with seminal and transformational contributions.

  Though not a strict prerequisite, expertise in cosmology, hydrodynamics, plasma physics, turbulence theory and interstellar radiative processes is desirable. Good knowledge and experience with programming languages is required.

  The student will lead the development of specific code modules, the set up of numerical simulations and the analysis of their results. She/he will also collaborate in the preparation of supercomputing proposals and will be the leading author of at least two publications per year in the second and third year of the project. The student will attend international conferences, workshops and focused schools on computational methods. She/he will spend part of the time at the Star and Planet Formation Center at the University of Copenhagen, to collaborate in the development of a new hydrodynamic code designed specifically for future exascale supercomputers.

  Because of the multidisciplinary nature of this project, requiring expertise in cosmology, interstellar medium physics, star formation, magneto-hydrodynamics and computational methods, the student is expected to interact with different research groups within the Institute of Cosmos Sciences at the University of Barcelona and at other research centers abroad. Besides the collaborators in Copenhagen, the student will interact with researchers from the University of Helsinki (implementation of radiative transfer codes), Harvard University (physics of turbulence), University of Lund (origin of planetesimals), NASA Ames (modeling of dust evolution), Max Planck Institute of Munich (chemistry of protoplanetary disks).

• The Origin of Terrestrial Planets[+]

  Group Leader: Paolo Padoan

  http://icc.ub.edu/people/103

  Research Project Description

  What sets the stage for the formation of rocky planets, possibly hosting conditions favorable to the emergence of life? Planets are the result of the evolution of dusty gaseous disks around young stars born within large clouds of cold interstellar gas containing thousands to millions of solar masses. To model ab initio the formation of protoplanetary disks we must develop a computational framework that captures the complex environment of star forming clouds, including the coupling of turbulence, magnetic fields, stellar radiation and gravity over a vast range of scales.

  The project is composed of two parts: 1) Large-scale simulations of star-forming clouds, to achieve a realistic description of initial and boundary conditions for a large number of young stars and their circumstellar disks. 2) Simulations of dust evolution in protoplanetary disks, embedding billions of inertial particles, to study the transport and evolution of dust grains coupled with the gas dynamics self-consistently.

  These are very challenging multi-scale and multi-physics computational problems, requiring state-of-the-art massively parallel codes and large supercomputing allocations. The development of numerical codes is thus an important part of this project, which is carried out in close collaboration with the computational astrophysics group at the University of Copenhagen. The group in Barcelona will be composed by Prof. Padoan (group leader), Prof. Estalella, Dr. Frimann, the PhD student, and long-term visitors from the University of Copenhagen. The main collaborators in Copenhagen will be Prof. Nordlund, Prof. Haugbølle and Prof. Jørgensen. We have a proven track record in the field of computational astrophysics, leading the most challenging supercomputing applications in supersonic turbulence, star formation, solar physics, and plasma physics.We are regularly awarded some of the largest allocations in supercomputing facilities in the USA (NASA High End Computing) and Europe (PRACE program).

  Job Position Description

  The PhD student who aspires to lead this project will have a keen interest in fundamental astrophysical processes, a demonstrated aptitude for the development and adoption of numerical codes, and a steadfast determination to become a world leader in the field of star formation, with seminal and transformational contributions.

  Though not a strict prerequisite, expertise in cosmology, hydrodynamics, plasma physics, turbulence theory and interstellar radiative processes is desirable. Good knowledge and experience with programming languages is required.

  The student will lead the development of specific code modules, the set up of numerical simulations and the analysis of their results. She/he will also collaborate in the preparation of supercomputing proposals and will be the leading author of at least two publications per year in the second and third year of the project. The student will attend international conferences, workshops and focused schools on computational methods. She/he will spend part of the time at the Star and Planet Formation Center at the University of Copenhagen, to collaborate in the development of a new hydrodynamic code designed specifically for future exascale supercomputers.

  Because of the multidisciplinary nature of this project, requiring expertise in cosmology, interstellar medium physics, star formation, magneto-hydrodynamics and computational methods, the student is expected to interact with different research groups within the Institute of Cosmos Sciences at the University of Barcelona and at other research centers abroad. Besides the collaborators in Copenhagen, the student will interact with researchers from the University of Helsinki (implementation of radiative transfer codes), Harvard University (physics of turbulence), University of Lund (origin of planetesimals), NASA Ames (modeling of dust evolution), Max Planck Institute of Munich (chemistry of protoplanetary disks).

• Astrophysical signatures of wave dark matter[+]

  Group Leader: Jordi Miralda-Escudé

  http://icc.ub.edu/people/95

  Research Project Description

  The proposed research focuses on investigating the nature of the dark matter, which comprises about 84% of all the matter in our Universe according to the most recent measurements from the Cosmic Background Radiation fluctuations. Two approaches are proposed for the research: in the first, the consequences of the presence of axions with a mass of the order of ~10(-22)eV as a component of the dark matter will be studied. Axions of this mass should behave as wave systems and would exhibit phenomena that are familiar in atomic physics but on the scale of a galaxy. Specifically, the research may focus on the impact of dynamical relaxation of dark matter in galaxies if all or part of the dark matter is axions of this very low mass. Predictions from this model can be confronted with observations of stellar dynamics in dwarf galaxies, as well as gravitational lensing in clusters of galaxies.

  A second approach would be to study alternative observational techniques through which the nature of the dark matter can be probed, including the possibility of the QCD axion, with a mass or order 10^(-4) eV. An example is the nature of Fast Radio Bursts, which are brief and powerful radio bursts that might be produced by clumps of QCD axion dark matter when colliding with neutron stars. The physics of dynamical relaxation in axion halos mentioned above also has applications to study the density profiles of QCD axion dark matter clumps that are predicted to form from small-scale isocurvature fluctuations in the dark matter density.

  Job Position Description

  The fellow joining this research program would collaborate in all aspects of the research, and would be trained in the required techniques for numerical calculations, cosmological simulation analysis, or observational data analysis that are required. The proposed topic of the nature of the dark matter is fairly broad and the fellow would have freedom to develop the project in the direction that is most promising and appealing. Required skills are a strong background in fundamental physics and mathematics for numerical analysis.

• A multi-messenger view of the extreme Universe: photons, neutrinos and cosmic rays from ative galactic nuclei[+]

  Group Leader: Matteo Cerruti

  http://icc.ub.edu/people/68

  Research Project Description

  The origin of the cosmic radiation, a flow of charged particles that constantly hit the Earth, remains, a century after its discovery, one of the major open questions in physics. This is especially the case for the ultra-high-energy cosmic rays (UHECRs), particles with E > 1018 eV. Their origin is likely extragalactic, and their very detection reveals the existence of extremely powerful and efficient cosmic accelerators. Yet, none of them has been clearly identified. With the discovery of active galactic nuclei (AGNs) and quasars at the beginning of the XX century, and the understanding that their extremely high luminosity is due to interaction of matter with a super-massive black-hole, these objects became an obvious candidate to explain UHECRs.

  A powerful tool to investigate the sources of cosmic rays is multi-messenger astronomy: if cosmic rays are accelerated in quasars’ jets, they interact with low-energy photons producing mesons which then decay to photons, leptons and neutrinos. Cosmic ray acceleration is thus inevitably linked to the emission of gamma-rays and neutrinos. On 09/17/2017, IceCube and the gamma-ray instruments Fermi-LAT and MAGIC, observed the first evidence (at the 3 sigma level) of coproduction of photons and neutrinos from an AGN. This event has sparkled interest on AGNs as neutrino emitters, and thus cosmic-ray accelerators. We are currently at a turning point in gamma-ray astronomy: the current generation of Cherenkov telescopes will make way for the new Cherenkov Telescope Array, CTA, which is currently under construction and will be fully operative in the next decade. During the next three years the early CTA data will be available, fostering the first multi-messenger studies in this new era of gamma-ray astronomy.

  The ICCUB is one of the leading laboratories in the Spanish gamma-ray community, with leading roles both in MAGIC and CTA, internationally renowned for its contributions to high-energy astrophysics and gamma-ray astronomy.

  Job Position Description

  The candidate will take an active role in the MAGIC and CTA Collaborations. He/she will have immediate access to MAGIC data, and will perform data analysis on AGNs and IceCube neutrino follow-ups. His/her role in CTA will evolve during the three years of the fellowship, from preparation of the observations and the data analysis, to the analysis of the very first CTA data. As part of his/her duty as collaboration member, the candidate will perform observing shifts at the MAGIC telescopes. Being part of an international collaboration, the position demands high mobility and excellent skills in written and oral communication in English.

  In parallel with the observational efforts, the candidate will work on the theoretical interpretation of the gamma-ray and neutrino data. For this part of the project, he/she will work in close interaction with the high-energy group at ICCUB, developing new numerical codes to simulate hadronic emission mechanisms in extragalactic sources. By comparing the predictions of numerical simulations to the gamma-ray and neutrino data, the candidate will constrain acceleration and radiation mechanisms in AGNs.

  The candidate will present his/her results in international conferences and will take a leading role in writing refereed papers on behalf of the collaborations.

  An excellent background in statistics, data analysis and computational physics is required.

• Data mining of Gaia releases: detection of Ultra Faint Dwarf Galaxies in the Galactic halo as probes for cosmological models[+]

  Group Leader: Xavier Luri

  http://icc.ub.edu/people/43

  Research Project Description

  In this project we propose to exploit the Gaia data (ESA, 2 nd Release, 2018 and 3rd Release, 2021) to study a key process that drives the evolution of galaxies: the assemblage of the Galactic halo. The study will be focused on the detection of the “Ultra Faint Dwarf Galaxies” (UFDGs), objects with very low luminosity dominated by dark matter. Very few UFDGs have been discovered in the last decades although its detection is extremely relevant for the so-called “missing satellite problem”, a dramatic discrepancy between the observed number of galaxy satellites and the large number predicted by the state-of-the-art cosmological Λ Cold Dark Matter (CDM) models. Up to now, its detection has been limited to searches of over-densities in specific sky areas and using only photometric surveys. The Gaia catalogue has full sky coverage and, for the first time, extremely accurate stellar kinematics. It opens the possibility to design and apply data mining techniques for searching these structures in an n-dimensional space. Here we aim to obtain a new and unbiased census of UFDGs in the MW.

  To detect UFDGs, the candidate will start by using the Wavelet Transform algorithms already designed by us (Antoja et al., 2015). She/he will use a tessellation method at the Mare Nostrum Supercomputers to run the algorithm using the 2 nd Gaia Data Release (about 1.3x10 9 stars), to derive a first list of new UFDGs we by the end of 2019. Next, new algorithms will be designed, developed and implemented in collaboration with the Workflows and Distributed Computing (WDC) group at the Barcelona Supercomputing Center (BSC). They will be applied both to real Gaia data and to high-resolution hydrodynamic N-body simulations of MW-like galaxies. In collaboration with the UCM (Madrid), and following our previous work (Roca-Fàbrega et al. 2016) we will use simulations obtained by using the newest versions of RAMSES code that include AGN feedback and SMBH formation (resolution lower than 50 pc).

  Job Position Description

  The PhD will be integrated in the Gaia group at the ICCUB under the group leader direction, combined with a co-direction from Dr. Rosa M Badia, leader of the WDC group at the BSC. This dual supervision will ensure the formation and support both in astrophysics and computing sciences. Dr. L.M. Sarro, from UNED, will bring the expertise on Bayesian parametric inference.

  The candidate will participate in the regular Astrophysics, Cosmology training courses (including outreach and communication) at the ICCUB and the BSC. She/he will be responsible to write papers in referred journals. She/he will also join. The WDC group does research in parallel programming models, more specifically in task-based programming models for distributed computing platforms. The group has been deploying their research in the PyCOMPSs/COMPSs programming framework, and has been developing several data mining algorithms like clustering classification and machine learning algorithms.

  The research experience and transferable skills gained will prepare the applicant not only for academy but also, if desired, for a research employment in other fields and even sectors. The applicant will strongly develop problem solving abilities, technical skills on big data, for sure useful in a broader employment market of the current times (e.g. working as a data scientist). We will provide to the candidate the skills needed to deal with the scientific exploitation of Gaia. She/he will be a member of the Gaia GREAT European network, in close connection with the Gaia Challenge DPAC-CU9 Working Group (DPAC: Gaia Data Processing and Analyzing Consortium, 400 European engineers and scientist working in Gaia). That will provide to the candidate training in a number of key areas including galactic and extragalactic astronomy and distributed computing, all of them focused on exploiting advanced database technologies to better facilitate the analysis and interpretation of Gaia's immense datasets.

• Black holes in stellar binary systems[+]

  Group Leader: Marc Ribó

  http://icc.ub.edu/people/57

  Research Project Description

  High Mass X-ray Binaries (HMXBs) are binary systems typically composed of a massive B-type star with emission lines (a so-called Be star) and a neutron star (NS). A few years ago, we discovered the first Be star with a black hole (BH) companion, opening a new field of research in HMXBs. We are now studying a second candidate, which, however, has already revealed a different and very interesting behavior, suggesting that it is another type of binary system. Both types of systems are key to understand different evolutionary paths that lead to the formation of BH-NS systems, which are potential sources of gravitational waves when they merge.

  The research project is focused on the discovery and multi-wavelength study of selected HMXBs, with a special emphasis on those containing Be stars with potential BH companions. These sources are potential emitters of gamma rays, as found in the case of the first Be/BH binary system. The project will require inspection and cross-correlation of catalogues, multi-wavelength observations in X-rays and radio, radial velocity studies at optical wavelengths and potential very-high-energy gamma-ray observations above 100 GeV with the MAGIC Cherenkov telescopes. The multi-wavelength observations will be interpreted to extract physical information of the geometries of the binary systems and the particle acceleration and emission/absorption processes taking place within them.

  The research group has worldwide experts in both multi-wavelength observations (Marc Ribó, Josep M. Paredes) and theory (Valentí Bosch-Ramon) of galactic HMXBs. We have a high rate of success in the approval of observational proposals in competitive international observatories with time allocation committees (e.g., Chandra, XMM, VLA, etc.). We are also members of the MAGIC Collaboration and the LST Consortium that operates the first telescope of the Cherenkov Telescope Array (CTA) in La Palma.

  Job Position Description

  This job position is focused on the observational study of binary systems with potential black holes with high-energy emission up to at least X rays. The PhD student will get familiar with HMXBs in general, and with those containing Be stars in particular. He/she will be introduced in the physics of accreting compact objects and in the scenarios producing broadband non-thermal emission. He/she will participate in the scientific justification and technical preparation of observational proposals, as well as in the data reduction and analysis processes, which will conclude in the interpretation of the obtained results and subsequent publication in peer-review international refereed journals. He/she will become member of the MAGIC Collaboration and might have to conduct observational shifts with the MAGIC telescopes.

  During the first year the PhD student will inspect and cross-correlate different multi-wavelength catalogues to search for new black hole candidates in binary systems and will propose observations to identify them. In parallel, he/she will analyze X-ray/radio observations already available and planned for the two Be binary systems identified. He/she will also contribute to understand the observed behavior at other wavelengths.

  During the second year the student will analyze the obtained data from the observations of the black hole candidates proposed in the first year to assess or reject their possible black hole nature. In parallel, he/she will work to build up a physical model that is consistent with the available observational data, to gain knowledge on the physical processes happening inside the already known systems. He/she will also participate in the elaboration of new observational proposals to test the physical models.

  During the third year of the PhD the student will analyze the observations planned during the second year to constrain the physical models of the HMXBs. He/she will summarize the work done to be defended as a PhD Thesis.

• Star formation at high redshift: clues from globular clusters[+]

  Group Leader: Mark Gieles

  http://icc.ub.edu/people/543

  Research Project Description

  The stellar initial mass function (IMF) defines how many stars form as a function of their mass. The exact shape, and whether it is universal across space and time, affects a wide range of astrophysical phenomena, from star and galaxy formation to gravitational waves. Evidence for IMF variations was found in elliptical galaxies, based on both stellar kinematics and analyses of their stellar populations. This PhD project will test the “universal IMF hypothesis” by studying the mass function of globular clusters (GCs). These are old, dense stellar systems with a few million stars and were among the first baryonic structures to form in the early Universe. Their stellar populations contain therefore vital information about the IMF at high redshift. In this PhD project, you will develop and use a new method to infer the IMF from GCs. The present day MF of stars and stellar remnants — such as white dwarfs — is modelled by including the effects of dynamical evolution and stellar evolution. The model MF is then used to create dynamical mass models of GCs, which are compared to star count and kinematics from the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) and the ESA--‐Gaia mission. The kinematics of the visible stars is used to constrain the invisible dark stars and stellar remnants! Combining results of GCs with different metallicities, masses and ages enables a unique new test of the universality of the IMF in the earliest phases of galaxy formation. The super--‐visor (Mark Gieles) is an ICREA Research Professor at the ICCUB.

  He is an expert in stellar dynamics, star formation and mass modelling of gravitational systems. He worked as a Royal Society University Research Fellow in the UK (Cambridge and Surrey) and is PI of a European Research Council (ERC) Starting Grant to study dark matter and black holes in the Milky Way. He is part of the “galaxy structure and evolution” group at the ICCUB, which actively participates in the ESA--‐ Gaia mission and related surveys.

  Job Position Description

  We will provide the candidate with the models for the stellar mass function, the dynamical models (LIMEPY) and the methods for fitting the models to the various observations. The supervisor has developed these models and has worked for several years on various observational applications (see related links). There may be the need to do numerical N--‐body simulations on dedicated Graphical Processing Units (GPUs) to generate mock data for doing tests of the dynamical models. Within the ICCUB there is a wealth of experience on scientific exploitation of data from the ESA--‐Gaia mission. This will provide training in a number of key areas on galactic and extragalactic astronomy; all of them focussing on exploiting advanced database technologies to better facilitate the analysis and interpretation of Gaia's immense datasets.

  List of desirable skill sets for the candidates:

  • 1. Basic concepts of stellar and Galactic dynamics;
  • 2. Some experience with statistics: e.g. maximum likelihood methods;
  • 3. Python programming language, Latex editing and Unix/Linux as operating system.

  The candidate will benefit from all the regular Astrophysics, Cosmology and Data Mining training courses at the ICCUB and specific courses on scientific communication and outreach. She/he will be in charge of writing the corresponding papers in refereed journals (Astrophysical Journal, MNRAS, etc). The research experience and transferable skills gained will prepare the applicant not only for academia but also, if desired, for a research employment in other fields and even sectors. The applicant will develop problem--‐solving skills and working with big data, all of which are useful in a broad range of future employments.

• First science with the CTA Large Sized Telescope[+]

  Group Leader: Marc Ribó

  http://icc.ub.edu/people/57

  Research Project Description

  During the last 15 years there has been a revolution in our understanding of the Universe at Very High Energy (VHE) gamma rays above 100 GeV. These photons are detected by ground-based Imaging Atmospheric Cherenkov Telescopes (IACTs) like HESS, MAGIC or VERITAS. A population of galactic sources has been unveiled close to the galactic plane, either by deep surveys or by dedicated observations of potential VHE emitters. Some of these sources have been studied in detail with the current generation of IACTs. However, the sensitivity of current experiments prevents the detection of short-term variability in most of these sources and does not allow us to obtain detailed spectra, limiting our understanding of the physical processes responsible of the VHE gamma-ray emission. In addition, a sensitivity improvement would allow us to discover and study in depth new types of sources.

  The Cherenkov Telescope Array (CTA) is the next generation facility for the study of the Universe in VHE gamma rays. It will have a site in the northern hemisphere, located in La Palma (Canary Islands, Spain) and another one in the southern hemisphere, located in Paranal (Chile). The northern site is already being constructed, and the first Large Sized Telescope (LST-1) of CTA has been inaugurated in 2018 October. Commissioning will take place until 2019 October, and first science together with the nearby MAGIC telescopes could be conducted already at the end of 2019. The use of LST-1 together with MAGIC will provide an unprecedented sensitivity at energies around 100 GeV. Since at ICCUB we are both members of the MAGIC Collaboration and the LST Consortium, we will have immediate access to these data. This research project is focused on the first science with the CTA LST and MAGIC, with particular emphasis in the study of transient/variable galactic and extragalactic sources. The research group is led by Dr. M. Ribó (CTA), Dr. J.M. Paredes (MAGIC) and Dr. V. Bosch-Ramon (theory).

  Job Position Description

  This job position is aimed for a young physicist with a strong interest in high-energy astrophysics, with some previous knowledge on the topic. He/she will become a member of the CTA Consortium, the LST sub-consortium and the MAGIC Collaboration. He/she will analyze, for the first time, gamma-ray data of CTA telescopes. For this reason, knowledge in python programming is desirable. The student will work in an international collaboration of hundreds of people and might have to travel de the Canary Island of La Palma to conduct commissioning and/or observational shifts of the LST-1 and MAGIC telescopes.

  During the first year the PhD student will help in the end of the commissioning and in the start of scientific observations with the LST-1 together with the MAGIC telescopes. This will provide him/her with a good knowledge of the data-reduction pipeline, in which development he/she might have to contribute.

  During the second year it is foreseen that the student starts reducing scientific data of galactic and extragalactic transient sources such as microquasars, gamma-ray binaries, gamma-ray bursts or fast radio bursts. The student will participate in the whole process, from the scientific justification of observational proposals to the data reduction, interpretation and publication of the obtained results. There will be particular emphasis in studying detailed VHE spectra to check if they can be fitted with simple power laws or if there are high-energy cut-offs. Short timescale variability will also be studied in these sources. The final goal is to constrain the astrophysical scenarios behind the sources, to unveil if the emission processes are basically leptonic (such as synchrotron and Inverse Compton) or hadronic (pion production and decay).

  During the third year of the PhD the student will propose new observations to be conducted with the 4 LSTs of CTA-North and will summarize the work done to be defended as a PhD Thesis.

Applications

All applications must be completed online at:

https://www.lacaixafellowships.org/index.aspx

This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Sklowdowska- Curie grant agreement No. 713673