PhD Research Fellow in Formal Methods and Knowledge Representation for Engineering Information

About the position

We invite applications for a PhD Research Fellow in Formal Methods and Knowledge Representation for Engineering Information at the Department of Informatics.

Starting date no later than 31.12.2026.

The fellowship period is three years.

Depending on the candidate and the teaching needs of the department, the fellowship period can be extended either for compulsory work consisting of e.g., teaching and supervision duties and research assistance up top four years.

No one can be appointed for more than one PhD Research Fellowship period at the University of Oslo.

Place of work is Department of Informatics at Blindern, Oslo.

Job description

This PhD project focuses on developing formal methods and knowledge representation techniques for the modelling and analysis of complex manufacturing and intralogistics systems, such as highly automated factories and warehouses with autonomous components. It addresses a fundamental challenge in industrial digitalization: the lack of formal, machine-interpretable representations that integrate structural, functional, spatial, and temporal aspects of engineering information. The research will investigate how such integrated representations can support consistency checking, automated reasoning, and the synthesis of behavioural models for dynamic analysis. Particular emphasis will be placed on the development of temporal modelling concepts, knowledge graphs, and formal verification techniques, enabling the automatic synthesis of timed and probabilistic behavioral models for model checking, performance evaluation, and optimization. The overall objective is to establish formal foundations that bridge static engineering descriptions and dynamic behavior, ultimately bridging static system design and dynamic operational analysis.

What skills are important in this role?

The Faculty of Mathematics and Natural Sciences has a strategic ambition to be among Europe’s leading communities for research, education and innovation. Candidates for these fellowships will be selected in accordance with this, and expected to be in the upper segment of their class with respect to academic credentials.

Required qualifications:

• Fluent oral and written communication skills in English 

Desired qualifications:

Language requirement:

For more information see:

The purpose of the fellowship is research training leading to the successful completion of a PhD degree.

All candidates and projects will have to undergo a check versus national export, sanctions and security regulations. Candidates may be excluded based on these checks. Primary checkpoints are the Export Control regulation, the Sanctions regulation, and the national security regulation.

What are we looking for in you?

Personal skills:

Employment in the position is based on a comprehensive assessment of all qualification requirements applicable to the position, including personal qualifications.

We need different perspectives in our work

UiO is an open and internationally oriented comprehensive university that strives to be an inclusive and diverse workplace and academic environment. You can read more about UiO’s work on equality, inclusion, and diversity at uio.no.

We fulfill our mission most effectively when we draw upon our variety of experiences, backgrounds, and perspectives. We are looking for great colleagues, could you be the next one?

We will do our best to accommodate your needs. Relevant adjustments may include modifications to working hours, task adaptations, digital, technical, or physical adjustments, or other practical measures.

If you have an immigrant background, a disability, or CV gaps (Norwegian), we encourage you to indicate this in the job application portal. We always invite at least one qualified candidate from each group for an interview. In this context, disability is defined as an applicant who identifies as having a disability that requires workplace or employment-related accommodations. For more details about the requirements, please refer to the Employer portal (Norwegian).

The selections made in the job application portal are used for anonymized statistics that all state employers include in their annual reports. More information about gender equality initiatives at UiO can be found here.

We hope you will apply for the position with us.

How to apply

The application must include:

When applying for the position, we ask you to retrieve your education results from Vitnemålsportalen.no. If your education results are not available through Vitnemålsportalen, we ask you to upload copies of your transcripts or grades. Please note that all documentation must be in English or a Scandinavian language.

General information

The best qualified candidates will invited for interviews.

Applicant lists can be published in accordance with Norwegian Freedom of Information Act § 25. When you apply for a position with us, your name will appear on the public applicant list. It is possible to request to be excluded from this list. You must justify why you want an exemption from publication and we will then decide whether we can grant your request. If we can't, you will hear from us.

Please refer to Regulations for the Act on universities and colleges chapter 3 (Norwegian), Guidelines concerning appointment to post doctoral and research posts at UiO (Norwegian) and Regulations for the degree of Philosophiae Doctor (PhD) at the University of Oslo.

The University of Oslo has a transfer agreement with all employees that is intended to secure the rights to all research results etc.