Postdoctoral Research Fellow

About the position

Position as Postdoctoral Research Fellow available at the HISP Centre, Department of Informatics.

Starting date as soon as possible.

The appointment is a fulltime position and is for a period of three years.  A fourth year may be considered with a work-load of 25 % which is devoted to other career promoting work, usually in the form of teaching, supervision duties, and/or research assistance. This is dependent upon the qualification of the applicant and the current needs of the department.

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

Postdoctoral fellows who are appointed for a period of four years are expected to acquire basic pedagogical competency in the course of their fellowship period within the duty component of 25 %.

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

Project description

A fully funded Postdoc position is available on the development of geographic information systems methodology and spatiotemporal modelling for climate-sensitive infectious disease forecasting. The work will contribute to ongoing efforts to build real-time, operational early warning systems in collaboration with international partners and public health institutions.

The position is based at the Department of Informatics, University of Oslo, and will be part of a growing research agenda at the intersection of geographic information systems, epidemiology, machine learning and public health information systems. The project aligns with recent developments at the HISP Centre at UiO, which is expanding its long-standing DHIS2 infrastructure to support predictive modeling and disease forecasting in low- and middle-income countries. The plan is for the candidate to collaborate closely with researchers at the HISP centre that work on complementary approaches to data interpolation and disease modelling as well as on development of platforms for running and evaluating prediction models.

The Postdoc candidate will develop methods for integrating heterogeneous data sources, such as climate, environmental, and health surveillance data, into interpretable spatiotemporal risk models. A main ambition is that the models will be suited for operationalization, meaning that they operate robustly and can be efficiently installed and tuned on a variety of computational infrastructures.

The main purpose of a postdoctoral fellowship is to provide the candidates with enhanced skills to pursue a scientific top position within or beyond academia. To promote a strategic career path, all postdoctoral research fellows are required to submit a professional development plan no later than one month after commencement of the postdoctoral period.

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.

Qualification requirements:

• Applicants must hold a degree equivalent to a Norwegian doctoral degree in Computer Science, Earth and Environmental Sciences or a related field
• Doctoral dissertation must be submitted for evaluation by the closing date. Only applicants with an approved doctoral thesis and public defense are eligible for appointment
• Documented experience with spatiotemporal modelling
• Documented experience with Geographic Information Systems
• Documented experience with programming in either Python or R
• Documented experience with newly established diseases due to climate change
• Fluent oral and written communication skills in English

Desired qualifications:

• Experience with disease modelling, ideally with climate-informed disease modelling
• An interest in interdisciplinary and applied public health research, in particular related to global health or climate-health linkages

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:

• Ability to work both independently and as part of a team
• Ability to work precise in a structured manner and swiftly adapts to new tasks
• Good communication and collaboration skills
• Positive attitude and the ability to handle hectic periods

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

We can offer you

• Exciting and meaningful tasks in an organization with an important societal mission, contributing to knowledge development, education, and enlightenment that promote sustainable, fair, and knowledge-based societal development
• Committed colleagues in a good working environment
• Good welfare schemes.
• Opportunity of up to 1.5 hours a week of exercise during working hours.  
• A workplace with good development and career opportunities
• Postdoctoral development programmes.
• Membership in the Statens Pensjonskasse, which is one of Norway's best pension schemes with beneficial mortgages and good insurance schemes.
• Salary in position as Postdoctoral Fellow, position code 1352 in salary range NOK 595 000 - 690 000, depending on competence and experience. From the salary, 2 percent is deducted in statutory contributions to the State Pension Fund. 

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:

• Cover letter (statement of motivation, summarizing scientific work and research interest)
• CV (summarizing education, positions, pedagogical experience, administrative experience and other qualifying activity)
• Copies of educational certificates, academic transcript of records
• A complete list of publications and up to 5 academic works that the applicant wishes to be considered by the evaluation committee
• Names and contact details of 2-3 references (name, relation to candidate, e-mail and telephone number)

Application with attachments must be submitted via our recruitment system Jobbnorge, click "Apply for the position".

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.

Please see the guidelines and regulations for appointments to Postdoctoral fellowships at the University of Oslo.

If an applicant has applied for and been granted funding for a fulltime research stay abroad while being employed as a Postdoctoral Research Fellow, the employment will be prolonged with the equivalent time as the research stay, but for no longer than of twelve months ( thus extending the employment to a maximum of four years).

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.

The University of Oslo has an agreement for all employees, aiming to secure rights to research results a.o.