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Open Postdoctoral position, faculty mentor Jef Caers

Stanford University

Job Description

HAI Postdoctoral Fellowship at the Stanford Mineral-X Initiative, Doerr School of Sustainability

Mineral X Initiative ’s Project: Energy transition minerals and the rainforest: AI for smarter mineral exploration and sustainable mining practices. As the energy transition accelerates, AI technologies are being used to speed up critical mineral explorations. Critical minerals, including Nickel, Cobalt, Copper, and Lithium, are in high demand for building towards 100% renewable power through electrification and batteries. However, such speed-up using AI raises environmental and human concerns: a majority of battery metals such as Ni and Co come from rainforests, including the Amazon, Indonesia, and the Congo. With this project, we aim to develop AI to plan smart, responsible, and sustainable critical mineral explorations in rainforest areas. Currently, environmental and human concerns are only raised at the mining stage, which is too late. We will develop a POMDP-based sequential planner that accounts quantitatively for environmental and human concerns. This AI planner includes reward structures related to water, energy, and land uses. The purpose is to allow exploration companies to abandon projects discovered unsuitable at the exploration stage rather than the late mining stage. We aim to set a leading example for sustainable mining in the rainforest, preserving the environment and justice, and accelerating the supply for energy transitions.

Stanford Mineral-X will provide the postdoctoral fellow mentorship in three ways:
The postdoc fellow will be directly advised by and work with the Stanford Mineral-X founder Prof. Jef Caers (Professor of Earth and Planetary Sciences, and by Courtesy, of Geophysics) and Dr. David Zhen Yin (program director). We will provide a supportive research community. The fellow will collaborate closely with Mineral-X’s industrial and research partners to develop AI planers for mine exploration. Mineral-X thrives on vibrant collaborations and knowledge-sharing. Mineral-X’s research scientists, postdoctoral fellows, and Ph.D. students are enthusiastic about sharing research ideas and knowledge to support the HAI postdoc fellow’s development. Stanford HAI is also committed to creating a diverse community of scholars who are engaged in contributing to the understanding and advancement of Human-Centered AI. Postdoctoral fellows will have the opportunity to engage with one another and with the broader Stanford HAI research community. They are also expected to participate in professional development, cohort-building, and other programmatic activities organized by HAI.
Evaluation Criteria

  • Ph.D. in geochemistry, geoscience, geological engineering, geophysics, mining engineering, or Earth and environmental sciences.
  • Research excellence in related areas as demonstrated through publications.
  • Real field geoscientific experiences, preferably in earth resources forecasting

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