Post Doc Researcher Machine Translation, Utrecht

University or Organization: Utrecht University
Department: UiL-OTS
Job Location: Utrecht, Netherlands
Web Address: http://www.uu.nl/EN/faculties/Humanities/research/researchinstitutes/uilots/
Job Rank: Post Doc
Specialty Areas: Computational Linguistics; Machine Translation

Description:

Post Doc Researcher Machine Translation

Context

UIL-OTS participates in the network of excellence project T4ME Net (Technologies for Multilingual Europe Network) financed by the EC in the Seventh Framework, in which 12 other partners from Europe are involved. The project is coordinated by DFKI (Germany).

T4ME Net aims to work towards a major collective technology acceleration in order to be able to preserve Europe's multilinguality. As a first step it aims at the development of a new paradigm of collective research in Machine Translation (MT) and other fields of language technology that is based on evolutionary principles, that integrates all required disciplines and schools of research and thus becomes adequate for the scope and complexity of the task. A second step is the development of shared visions and of a strategic research agenda (SRA) based on the new paradigm of research

UIL-OTS is involved in several aspects of this project but the main focus is on bringing more semantics into MT. The project will test the hypothesis that semantics can help increase accuracy of Machine Translation systems. In order to do so, first an inventory of semantic tools suitable for inclusion into current MT systems will be made. Each participant will select one direction of exploration. The selected systems and semantic tools will be then integrated and the contribution of semantics will be evaluated against existing evaluation datasets from MT challenges.

The T4ME project starts in February 2010 and runs for 3 years. The total project budget is more than 7M Euro.

The Uil-OTS contribution is coordinated by prof.dr. Jan Odijk. The research will be carried out at UIL-OTS in Utrecht, the Netherlands.

Tasks and Responsibilities

The researcher carries out research focused on bringing semantics into MT and evaluating it, ensuring that part of this research is in accordance with the T4ME project plan and any arrangements made later in the project. The researcher also supports the UIL-OTS project coordinator with other tasks assigned to UiL-OTS in the T4ME project

Requirements and Profile

- PhD Thesis in computational linguistics or natural language processing, preferably in the area of machine translation
- Excellent knowledge of and experience with machine translation, evaluation of machine translation, and semantic components that might be put to use in MT systems.
- Excellent knowledge of English
- Willingness and ability to travel abroad regularly (mainly in Europe)
- Excellent communicative skills, both orally and in writing
- Willing and able to work under high pressure and with tight deadlines

Appointment

Appointment is for 1 FTE (0.8 FTE can be discussed) at the university of Utrecht, for a period of 3 years starting February 1, 2010. Assignment of the researcher to a salary scale will depend on knowledge and experience, but will at least be 10.5.

Applications

Send a resume in PDF-format via e-mail to prof.dr. Jan Odijk at the email address below before March 15, 2010.
Application Deadline: 15-Mar-2010
Email Address for Applications: j.odijkuu.nl

Contact Information:

Jan Odijk
Email: j.odijkuu.nl