Job ID: 122735

Postdoc & PhD position in computational neuroscience

Position: Post-doctoral Position

Deadline: 12 June 2025

Employment Start Date: 1 June 2025

Contract Length: 2-3 years (Postdoc), 4 years (PhD)

City: Bern

Country: Switzerland

Institution: University of Bern

Department:

Description:

Postdoc or PhD position on cortical self-attention

The Senn lab offers a Postdoc or PhD position on a computational model of cortical self-attention (supported by EBRAINS 2.0). Based on our current work and a collaboration with The Virtual Brain (Marmaduke Woodman), we seek for an implementation of neuronal self-attention mechanisms in thalamo-cortical circuits. The model is inspired by transformer-type architectures, but is consistent with experimentally observed cortical connectivity patterns. It shall be trained on cognitive tasks while being constrained to human cortical recordings.

Postdoc or PhD position on the Neuronal Least-Action principle

The Senn lab also offers a Postdoc or PhD position on the Neuronal Least-Action principle and its extention to long-term temporal processing and spikes (supported by the SNSF). The framework offers a rigorous description of the neuronal dynamics in cortical networks together with gradient-based synaptic learning rules. It will be applied to integrate-and-fire neurons with multiple intrinsic time constants. The project links to implementations in spike-based neuromorphic hardware.

Ideal candidates for all positions have a strong background in computational neuroscience, machine learning and mathematics. The Postdoc positions start with a contract for 2 years, but are extendable to 3 years. Please send CV, letter of motivation, and publication list latest by April 28, 2025,  to walter.senn@unibe.ch and virginie.sabado@unibe.ch.