Tuesday, January 5, 2010

[DMANET] PhD position: Design and Complexity of Mechanisms

University of Twente

Faculty of Electrical Engineering, Mathematics, and Computer Science

The Department of Applied Mathematics offers


**** PhD position: Design and Complexity of Optimal Mechanisms ****


The project is funded by University of Twentes Centre for
Telematics and Information Technology (CTIT), the largest academic ICT research
institute in the Netherlands. It makes part of the strategic research
orientation on Industrial Engineering and ICT; see
http://www.ctit.utwente.nl/research/sro/ie-ict/

Requirements
We are looking for excellent applicants with MSc degree in any
relevant area of Mathematics, Computer Science, or Econometrics. We
expect an enthusiastic person with a commitment to do fundamental
research. Knowledge in Combinatorial Optimization and Mechanism Design
are highly appreciated. Moreover, the candidate must have good
communication skills, in writing as well as oral. Your main task will
be to do research, but you will be given opportunities to acquire
teaching experience, too. Starting date is March 2010.

What we offer
We offer a 4-year research position in a dynamic and international
environment. The gross salary ranges from EURO 2.042,00 (first year) to
EURO 2.612,00 (fourth year). The labor agreements are in accordance
with the CAO-NU for Dutch universities, and include a holiday allowance
(8%) and an end-of-year bonus (8.3%), and a number of additional
benefits. Additionally, the University of Twente provides excellent
campus facilities, and actively supports professional and personal
development. The position is affiliated to the chair Discrete
Mathematics and Mathematical Programming, see http://
dmmp.ewi.utwente.nl (Prof. Marc Uetz). Working language is English,
Dutch, or German. The candidate will be given the opportunity to
follow the PhD program offered by the LNMB (Dutch Network on the
Mathematics of Operations Research), see http://www.lnmb.nl.


Brief Project Description
In Mechanism Design the aim is to implement a social choice function
by taking into account private information and incentives of
individuals. The most well know example is the single item auction.
Here, an optimal mechanism is an auction that maximizes the revenue of
the seller, to give an example. In this project, we aim at the design
and analysis of optimal mechanisms in settings other than auctions,
for example scheduling and applications in the design of service
systems. In particular, we aim at suitable models that allow us to
analyze the computational complexity of optimal mechanism design
problems.

Information and application
You are invited to send your application letter together with a short
curriculum vitae, a list of publications (if any), an abstract of your
master thesis, a list of courses you have followed (with grades), and
the names and addresses of two potential referees. Please send your
application before January 31, 2010 to: Dini Heres-Ticheler,
University of Twente, Faculty EEMCS, Dept. Applied Mathematics, P.O.
Box 217, 7500 AE
Enschede, The Netherlands.
Preferably by email to: heresbfj@math.utwente.nl. For more information
you are welcome to contact:
Marc Uetz (m.uetz@utwente.nl, ++31 53 489 34 20)
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