PhD Studentship in Computer Science: AI and Machine Learning Explainability

Award summary

100% Home fees covered and a minimum tax-free annual living allowance of £18,622 (2023-24 UKRI rate)

Overview

One of the main issues with machine learning algorithms is that they are black boxes to human users. It is difficult to make sense of why a machine learning approach has provided a particular result as output. In this project, students will create explainable systems for machine learning systems. Through visualisation techniques, we will help open the black box of the model to understand training and/or predictions. This area, broadly speaking, is the target and applicants could help shape the project in this domain. We are also interested in understanding the learning dynamics (i.e., loss landscape and backwards propagation) and feature interaction (i.e., attention mechanism) at a large scale neural networks using novel visualisation approaches.

Number of awards: 1

Start date: September 2024

Award duration: 3.5 years

Sponsor: School of Computing, Newcastle University

Supervisors: Professor Daniel Archambault

Eligibility criteria:

You must have, or expect to gain, a minimum 2:1 Honours degree or international equivalent in a subject relevant to the proposed PhD project which is computer science.

Applicants whose first language is not English require an IELTS score of 6.5 overall with a minimum of 5.5 in all sub-skills.  

The studentship covers fees at Home rate (UK and EU applicants with pre-settled/settled status and meet the residency criteria). International applicants are welcome to apply but will be required to cover the difference between Home and International fees. 

International applicants may require an ATAS (Academic Technology Approval Scheme) clearance certificate prior to obtaining their visa and to study on this programme. 

How to apply:

Use Apply to Newcastle Portal

Once registered select ‘Create a Postgraduate Application’.

Use ‘Course Search’ to identify your programme of study:

• Search for the ‘Course Title’ using the programme code: 8050F
• Research Area: Computing Science 
• Select ‘PhD Computer Science (full time) - Computing Science' as the programme of study 

In ‘Further Details’ section please upload: 

• ‘Personal Statement’ - upload document or write statement directly into application form
• ‘Research Proposal’ - when prompted for how you are providing your research proposal - select ‘Write Proposal’. You should then type in the title of the research project from this advert – you do not need to provide your own statement.
• Studentship code COMP2163 in the ‘Studentship/Partnership Reference’ field.

In ‘Supporting Documentation’ please upload:

• Covering letter and CV 
• Degree transcripts and certificates and, if English is not your first language, a copy of your English language qualification if already completed. 

You must submit one application per studentship, you cannot apply for multiple studentships on one application. 

Contact details: Professor Daniel Archambault

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