HIIT Research Fellow and Postdoctoral Fellow Positions in ICT
The Helsinki Institute for Information Technology (HIIT) invites applications for Postdoctoral Fellows and Research Fellows. HIIT offers a HIIT Postdoctoral Fellow position up to three years. For more senior candidates, HIIT offers a HIIT Research Fellow position up to five years. The length of the contract as well as the starting and ending dates are negotiable.
All excellent researchers in any area of ICT can be considered, but priority is given to candidates who support one (or more) of the HIIT strategic focus areas:
- Artificial Intelligence
- Computational Health
- Cybersecurity
- Data Science
- Foundations of Computing
The deadline for applications is February 4th, 2024 at 11:59 PM (23:59 UTC+02:00). By applying to this call, organized by Helsinki Institute for Information Technology HIIT, you use one application to apply to positions for both of our hosting institutions, Aalto University and the University of Helsinki. Aalto University and the University of Helsinki are the two leading universities in Finland in computer science and information technology. Both are located in the Helsinki Metropolitan area, and the employing university will be determined by the supervising professor. Aalto University and the University of Helsinki are both committed to fostering an inclusive environment with people from diverse backgrounds, and researchers from underrepresented groups are particularly encouraged to apply.
To find out more information about these focus areas and supervisors/research groups, please find the corresponding section below:
Position Summary:
HIIT provides funding for two types of researchers: Research Fellows and Postdoctoral Fellows. These positions are meant to support the career development of excellent researchers who plan a career as a scientist.
HIIT Research Fellow
HIIT Research Fellow positions support the career development of excellent advanced researchers who already have some postdoctoral research experience. While HIIT Research Fellows have a designated supervisor at University of Helsinki or Aalto, they are expected to develop their own research agenda and to gain the skills necessary to lead their own research group in the future. HIIT Research Fellows should strengthen Helsinki’s ICT research community either through collaboration or by linking ICT research with another scientific discipline. In either case, excellence and potential for impact are the primary criteria for HIIT Research Fellow funding.
The contract period is up to five years in length.
HIIT Postdoctoral Fellow
HIIT Postdoctoral Fellow positions are intended for researchers who have recently completed their doctoral degrees, typically within the last three years. HIIT Postdoctoral Fellows are not hired to work on externally funded projects but are intended to support one or more of the aforementioned HIIT strategic focus areas. These positions provide opportunities for development as a researcher within a research area from one of the four departments conducting ICT research in Aalto University and University of Helsinki.
The contract period is up to three years in length.
Focus Areas
Artificial intelligence (AI) is central to the development of modern digital societies. Our research covers both theoretical and applied AI, including both statistical and symbolic approaches. Furthermore, we collaborate with a wide range of partners in both the private and public spheres.
Below is a list of possible supervisors (and their corresponding research groups and/or research interests) that are looking to supervise prospective candidates.
| Supervisor Name | Research Interests | Research Group (If Applicable) |
| Dorota Glowacka (UH) | Information systems, interactive information retrieval, recommender systems | Exploratory Search and Personalisation (ESP) group |
| Perttu Hämäläinen (Aalto) | games, animation technology, human-computer interaction, gameplay innovation, exercise gamification, procedural animation | |
| Matti Järvisalo (UH) | Automated reasoning and combinatorial optimization, SAT solving and extensions, Pseudo-Boolean reasoning and optimization, Implicit hitting set computation | Constraint Reasoning and Optimization group |
| Jussi Kangasharju (UH) | Networking, edge computing, intelligent networking | Collaborative Networking Group |
| Kai Puolamäki (UH) | Explainable Artificial Intelligence, Uncertainty Quantification, Machine Learning for Science | Exploratory Data Analysis group |
| Jussi Rintanen (Aalto) | automated reasoning, planning and decision-making, intelligent software systems | |
| Robin Welsch (Aalto) | Human-Computer Interaction, psychology | Human- AI Interaction Group |
| Bo Zhao (Aalto) | efficient data-intensive systems, machine learning, data management | Aalto Data-Intensive System group |
Computational Health aims to develop theory and computational methods for complex data and systems in medicine and healthcare. We focus on scaling up computation for large numbers of genomes, machine learning methods for medical big data, as well as complex network modelling and mining. We collaborate with top medical research groups and hospitals to bring our tools towards practical use in healthcare decision support systems.
Below is a list of possible supervisors (and their corresponding research groups and/or research interests) that are looking to supervise prospective candidates.
| Supervisor Name | Research Interests | Research Group (If Applicable) |
| Pekka Marttinen (Aalto) | Machine Learning for Health (ML4H) Research Group | |
| Veli Mäkinen (Helsinki) | Genome-scale algorithmics Research Group |
Cybersecurity is the protection of computer systems and networks from the theft of or damage to their hardware, software, or electronic data, as well as from the disruption or misdirection of the services they provide. This research area studies secure systems including human factors, software and hardware. The long-term mission of the Cybersecurity focus area is to enable the design, building and deployment of distributed large-scale systems, where each node (component, device, network element etc.) contributes in verifying trustworthiness of the entire system. Each node would also be able to verify whether any other node or even the entire system is trustworthy.
Below is a list of possible supervisors (and their corresponding research groups and/or research interests) that are looking to supervise prospective candidates.
| Supervisor Name | Research Interests | Research Group (If Applicable) |
| Jussi Kangasharju (UH) | Networking, edge computing, intelligent networking | Collaborative Networking Group |
| Valtteri Niemi (UH) | 5G, Network and System Security, Privacy Protocols |
The data science focus area deals with the task of extracting knowledge and insights from data, which is important across many fields of science. The aim is to solve significant societal and industrial challenges related to data analysis.
Below is a list of possible supervisors (and their corresponding research groups and/or research interests) that are looking to supervise prospective candidates.
| Supervisor Name | Research Interests | Research Group (If Applicable) |
| Dorota Glowacka (UH) | Information systems, interactive information retrieval, recommender systems | Exploratory Search and Personalisation (ESP) group |
| Jussi Kangasharju (UH) | Networking, edge computing, intelligent networking | Collaborative Networking Group |
| Michael Mathioudakis (UH) | Data management, ML model management and materialization, instance-optimal indexing, graph processing | Algorithmic Data Science Group |
| Petteri Nurmi (UH) | Internet of Things, pervasive computing, data science | Pervasive Data Science Group |
| Kai Puolamäki (UH) | Explainable Artificial Intelligence, Uncertainty Quantification, Machine Learning for Science | Exploratory Data Analysis group |
| Bo Zhao (Aalto) | Aalto Data-Intensive System group |
The foundations of computing focus area integrates a broad range of foundational expertise spanning multiple areas of algorithmics, cryptography, logic, and quantum computing. We welcome applicants working in all areas of theoretical computer science, broadly interpreted, including e.g. algorithmics and algorithm engineering, computability and computational complexity, computational logic, optimization, cryptography, computational geometry, natural computation, and foundations of distributed, parallel, and quantum computing.
Below is a list of possible supervisors (and their corresponding research groups and/or research interests) that are looking to supervise prospective candidates:
| Supervisor Name | Research Interests | Research Group (If Applicable) |
| Matti Järvisalo (UH) | Automated reasoning and combinatorial optimization, SAT solving and extensions, Pseudo-Boolean reasoning and optimization, Implicit hitting set computation | Constraint Reasoning and Optimization group |
| Sándor Kisfaludi-Bak (Aalto) | geometric algorithms, hyperbolic computational geometry, geometric intersection graphs | Computational Geometry Group |
We do not limit our research to our focus areas. If you believe that your research lies outside of our focus areas, not listed in the supervisor group above, or if you are uncertain which focus area you belong, please select the “Other” option in our eRecruitment system. Our reviewers will look through your application to determine which area or supervisor suits your research interests best.
More Information
In order to find the best match between candidates and supervisors, all applicants need to describe their research interests and how they see themselves contributing to one or more HIIT focus areas. Those applying for the more senior HIIT Research Fellow positions should also provide a research plan.
The applications are to be submitted through the eRecruitment system. By applying through our eRecruitment system, you can apply to multiple focus areas. In the application, you are required to list the focus area you would like to apply to.
Required attachments:
(1) Cover letter (1-2 pages in length) which includes the intended research area and how you intend to contribute to the focus area. If you have a potential supervisor(s), you should clearly state your motivation for applying to work with said supervisor, how you could contribute to the research produced by the supervisor and research area, and other relevant information. For more senior researchers, you should also include a preliminary research plan (3-5 pages) which includes background information, research objectives and methods, possible hypothesised results, possible collaboration, and any other key information.
(2) CV
(3) List of publications (please do not attach full copies of publications)
(4) A transcript of doctoral studies and the degree certificate of the doctoral degree
(5) Contact details of possible referees from 2-3 senior academic people. We will contact your referees, if recommendation letters are required.
All materials should be submitted in English in a PDF format. Note: files should be 5MB max. You can upload up to five files to the eRecruitment system, each 5MB.
In the evaluation of the candidates, emphasis is put on the quality of the candidate’s previous research and international experience as well as the innovativeness, impact potential, feasibility of the research plan, and its relevance to one or more of the focus areas. The ability to link work between two or several research groups from different areas, and initiate or enhance collaboration, is an additional positive aspect.
Candidates short-listed for the Postdoctoral Fellow position may be invited for an interview either at the Otaniemi or Kumpula campus or for an interview conducted via Zoom. Candidates short-listed for the Research Fellow position may be invited to provide a public lecture at either the Otaniemi or Kumpula campus or via Zoom.
HIIT follows the guidelines of the university agreement for salaries. The salary for a postdoctoral researcher starts typically from about 3600 EUR per month depending on experience and qualifications. Those who are a more senior candidate and will work as a Research Fellow shall receive a higher compensation in regards to their experience. The length of the contract for both the HIIT Postdoctoral Researcher and HIIT Research Fellow as well as the start and end dates are negotiable. In addition to the salary, the contract includes occupational health benefits in combination with Finland’s comprehensive social security system. More information about the benefits from our hosting institutions can be found on their respective websites: Aalto University University of Helsinki
The annual total workload of teaching/research staff at the recruiting universities is 1624 hours. The position is located at either Aalto University’s Otaniemi campus or the University of Helsinki’s Kumpula campus. The positions belong to the university career system and the selected persons will be appointed for fixed-term positions, for Postdoctoral Researchers up to three (unless otherwise stated) and for Research Fellows up to five years. In addition to research work, the persons hired are expected to participate in the supervision of students and teaching following the standard practices of the hiring department.
The candidate should have a PhD in an appropriate field at the time of starting the position. If a candidate does not have a PhD at the time of the application, a detailed plan of completion must be submitted. The candidate should also have an excellent track record in scientific research with publications in one or more fields relevant to the position. A good command of English is a necessary prerequisite.
For questions regarding these positions and the electronic recruiting system, please contact the HIIT coordinator at coordinator@hiit.fi
Helsinki Institute for Information Technology HIIT brings together the world-class expertise of Aalto University and the University of Helsinki in joint research centers and programs. The mission of the Helsinki Institute for Information Technology HIIT is to enhance the quality, visibility and impact of Finnish research on information technology and support cooperation between ICT researchers, researchers in other fields, industry and public organisations. To find out more information about HIIT, please visit our website.