The George Mason University Departments of Geography and Geoinformation Science and Computational and Data Sciences within the College of Science have an immediate opening for a Postdoctoral Research Fellow position. The position is for 1 year, with the possibility of annual renewal, subject to budgetary approval. George Mason University has a strong institutional commitment to the achievement of excellence and diversity among its faculty and staff, and strongly encourages candidates to apply who will enrich Mason’s academic and culturally inclusive environment.

Mason Science is committed to advancing access, justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion (A-JEDI) throughout our STEM community, including within our hiring and retention practices. At Mason Science, our values include fostering an organizational culture that promotes anti-racism, belonging, respect, and civility. We believe that a diversity of opinions, cultures, and perspectives is what provides vibrancy, innovation, and growth to an academic community. By prioritizing inclusive excellence in academics, teaching, research, and global engagement, we strive to attract a diverse pool of faculty and staff who exemplify the Mason Science mission and vision.

Responsibilities:

This position will be part of the “Urban Simulation” project, a multi-institutional team conducting research as part of the IARPA’s “HAYSTAC” program. The GMU team is directed by Drs. Taylor Anderson, Hamdi Kavak, and Dieter Pfoser.

The primary job responsibilities of this position consist of the design, development, and refinement of an agent-based urban simulation framework that incorporates synthetic populations, realistic social behavior, and patterns of life. One of the main goals of this project is to create computationally efficient and plausible agent logic, thus allowing millions of agents to make decisions, find shortest paths between locations, and interact with their simulated world at the same time. For this purpose, implemented algorithms will need to be highly parallelizable, thus allowing to scale simulation using a cloud computing infrastructure. The successful candidate will have the opportunity to supervise graduate-level research assistants, collaborate with fellow scholars including a team of postdocs, and promote the accomplishments through publications, presentations, and other public events.

Required Qualifications:

For full consideration, applicants must apply at https://jobs.gmu.edu/; complete and submit the online application; and upload a cover letter, curriculum vitae (CV), and a list of three professional references with contact information.