Research Associate

Contract Type: Fixed Term - 16 Months

Closing Date: 23.59 hours BST on Thursday 01 August 2024  (unless otherwise stated)

Are you an experienced researcher looking to join an exciting new project within the School of Computing? Do you hold a PhD/equivalent or close to completion in Computer Science, with strong research interests in programming language theory and implementation? 

 If so this full-time, fixed term role as Research Associate, may be ideal. 

The School of Computing seeks to appoint a Research Associate to work on part of the EPSRC Project: “MEBI: Mechanised Bisimilarties and Behavioural-typed Processes.” 

Behavioural-typed process calculi are formalisms that have been successfully used to guarantee the absence of deadlocks, livelocks, and race conditions in message-passing concurrent and distributed systems. However, the correctness of such techniques relies on complex pen-and-paper proofs that are hard to check or extend. This has caused several instances of unsound extensions to well-known theories, or bugs in the implementation of such theories. A potential solution to such problems is the mechanisation of these techniques as part of a proof assistant. A key difficulty in such mechanisations is proving when two processes (or behavioural specifications) are equivalent.

As Research Associate you will help in the mechanisation of algorithms for deciding bisimilarities (process equivalences) in a proof assistant. Such algorithms will be used as part of a growing framework for the verification of concurrent and distributed systems.

The successful candidate will work in close collaboration with the PI, an expert in mechanisation of session-type systems (David Castro-Perez), as well as two project partners: (1) Dr Alceste Scalas, an expert in session-type theory and implementation, and (2) Prof. Marco Carbone, an expert in concurrency theory.

 As a Research Associate you will:

• Study and select bisimilarity algorithms that are suitable for integrating in a proof assistant.
• Assist in the development of the project’s case studies, focusing on the extraction of verified code.
• To support evaluation of results in a principled way, e.g., via comparison with state-of-the-art mechanisations of process calculi.
• Disseminate and publicise research findings via conferences, academic publications, and blog posts.
• Produce high quality, publishable research relevant to the project objectives.
• Contribute to the intellectual development of the project.

To be successful in this role you will have:

• Hold a PhD/equivalent (or near completion) in Computer Science 
• Strong knowledge and hands-on experience of functional and concurrent programming 
• Good grasp of type systems and typed programming language definitions
• Experience of presenting to academic audiences
• Brilliant problem solving and mathematical skills

Please see the links below to view the full job description and click the 'Apply' button above to apply for this post. If you require further information regarding the application process, please contact the People Services Team on peopleserviceshr@kent.ac.uk quoting ref number CEMS-265-24. 

If you have any questions regarding the role/project, please contact David Castro-Perez at d.castro-perez@kent.ac.uk - quoting the role and ref number CEMS-265-24. 

Further details:   

Please note that we prioritise applications from current University of Kent redeployees. We will let you know if this post is to be filled by a redeployee as, in this instance, your application will unfortunately not be taken forward.

Applications must be made via the University’s online application system; CVs or details sent directly to the department or via email cannot be considered.

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