LPC AI Fellowships

The LHC Physics Center (LPC) at Fermilab is delighted to announce a new program - the LPC Artificial Intelligence (AI) Fellowship. We are looking for postdoctoral researchers and graduate students from across the CMS collaboration with interest in applying machine learning (ML) techniques to challenges in High Energy Physics. Successful applicants are expected to spend at least half of their time conducting research in the area of ML applications developed specifically for CMS. The proposed ML research topics should be of interest to the broader CMS community and cannot focus on applications to a specific data analysis. Examples of proposal topics include, but are not limited to: development of novel ML-based solutions for data simulation, reconstruction, triggering, data quality monitoring, and detector operations. The expected starting date for the position is Fall of 2021. The exact dates might be adjusted in individual cases, at the discretion of the LPC coordinators, depending on the Fermilab site access restrictions due to the COVID-19 pandemic (https://fnal.gov/covid19).

Current (2021) LPC AI Fellows are listed here.

Successful candidates will ordinarily be resident at the LPC for 50% or more of their time as an AI fellow. They will receive up to 50% remuneration with the remainder provided by the home institution. The remuneration will be limited to salary and fringe benefits; university overhead will not be paid. The fellows will also receive a modest travel budget to enable travel to the LPC and to conferences to present work. Each position is tenable for a minimum of six months and a maximum of one year, in the first instance. Renewal is possible but requires a new proposal.

Applications consist of a CV, a cover letter, and a research proposal. At least three letters of recommendation are also required. The research plan should highlight the impact which the proposal is expected to have on CMS, connections with AI/ML activities already taking place at the LPC, or lay out a clear plan to start a new ML program that will enhance the LPC contributions to CMS. The plan should also contain a section that clearly explains how your research proposal would change if access to the LPC and other Fermilab facilities remains restricted. The cover letter should clearly state 1) start and end dates, 2) plan for residency at the LPC, and 3) current salary and fringe. The LPC programs do not pay for indirect cost charges.

The LPC serves primarily as a resource and physics analysis hub for several hundred physicists at US institutions in the CMS collaboration. The center offers a vibrant community of CMS scientists from US and overseas institutions, that play leading roles in analysis of data, in the definition and refinement of physics objects, in detector commissioning and operations, and in the design and development of the detector upgrade. The LPC is also a major hub for Machine Learning developments for particle physics. There is close and frequent collaboration with the Fermilab theory community. The LPC provides outstanding computing resources and software support personnel. The proximity of the CMS Tier-1 and the CMS Remote Operations Center at Fermilab allows critical real time connections to the experiment. Fermilab technical facilities support detector instrumentation developments. The LPC also offers educational workshops and tutorials in analysis techniques, software development and organizes conferences and seminar series. For a full range of LPC activities please refer to the main LPC page: http://lpc.fnal.gov

Applications will be handled online at:
https://academicjobsonline.org/ajo/jobs/18277

Questions about the CMS LPC AI Fellowship program may be directed to the LPC coordinators.