Senior Post Doctoral Researcher

Maynooth University is committed to a strategy in which the primary University goals of excellent research and scholarship and outstanding education are interlinked and equally valued.

We are seeking a Senior Post-Doctoral Researcher to join the Geospatial Machine Learning (Geo-ML) project in the National Centre for Geocomputation at Maynooth University. This position has arisen as the result of a LERO Research Impact Fellowship award to both Professor John McDonald and Prof Tim McCarthy.

A wide variety of global scale factors such as climate change, shifting demographic patterns and geo-political instability have has resulted in an unprecedented increase in emergency events that are reported by the media on almost a daily basis. These events range from natural/anthropogenic catastrophes such as wildfires, flooding and storm damage to refugee and humanitarian crises. These emergency events can vary in terms of cause, scale, and/or impact, but they typically share common challenges in how best to manage these incidents. How we gather, share and ultimately use data and information in a timely fashion in order to help prepare responses for these events, e.g. mobilising crews, assessing damage, allocating resources, managing risk etc. are essential requirements shared by most emergency events, as well as how to do these solutions in an efficient, cost-effective and low-risk manner.

One key shortcoming revolves around how software systems can be configured so that relevant, multi-thematic, multi-dimensional datasets (Geospatial, Remote Sensing, social media, mobile devices) can be captured, collated, fused, analysed and transformed into useful information that can – in this example - be rapidly transmitted and shared with Emergency Coordinators, Incident Commanders, Responders and Observers in a timely fashion. Geo-AI can be classified as an emerging field which attempts to capture, process and model real-world environments/events within cyberspace and cyber-physical systems, presenting both opportunities and challenges.

Currently, these software architectures do not take advantage of emerging Geospatial-AI (Geo-AI) technologies (e.g. Geospatial Analysis, Geocomputation, Spatial Modelling, Robotics, Sensor Technologies, ML etc.) to carry-out rapid, wide-area mapping, 2.5D real-world modelling and highly automated feature detection and classification. Placing Geo-AI at the heart of contemporary software architectures will lead to significant improvements in the four typical phases of any emergency event; mitigation, preparedness, response and recovery; and in doing so, reduce cost, safeguard life and optimise outcomes in terms of environment and impacts to wider society.

This two-year project plans to address these shortcomings with an overall aim of exploring, developing, testing and assessing scalable software frameworks for supporting integrated Geospatial & AI functions and operations, which can be applied to Real-World Challenges through engaged research with key stakeholders in application areas such as Autonomous Systems, Sustainability and Emergency Event Management.

Salary

Post-Doctoral Researcher (2025):              €45,847 – €49,671 p.a. (4 points)

Senior Post-Doctoral Researcher (2025):    €53,770 – €58,479 p.a. (4 points)

Appointments will be made in accordance with public sector pay provisions.

Closing Date:

23:30hrs (local Irish time) on 20th July 2025.

Please note all applications must be made via our Online Recruitment Portal at the following link:

https://www.maynoothuniversity.ie/human-resources/vacancies

Applications must be submitted by the closing date and time specified above. Any applications which are still in progress at the closing time on the specified closing date will be cancelled automatically by the system.

Late applications will not be accepted.

Maynooth University is an equal opportunities employer

The position is subject to the Statutes of the University