[agents] PhD and Postdoc Offers on Agents and Multi-agent Systems for Musical Metacreation (SFU, Vancouver)

[Philippe Pasquier]

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PhD and Postdoc Offers on Agents and Multi-agent Systems for Musical Metacreation 
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The School of Interactive Arts and Technology of Simon Fraser University (Vancouver, Canada) offers a three-years PhD scholarship and a one year Post-doctoral research position for students willing to pursue research in Artificial Intelligence and Computational Creativity. 

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Project and Position Descriptions 
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A metacreation is a software which, using aspects of artificial intelligence, cognitive modeling, artificial life or machine learning, displays creative behaviors; that is behaviors which would be considered creative if performed by humans. New musical metacreation software systems will be developed that extend, refine and apply techniques from the fields of artificial agents, multi-agent systems and cognitive modeling. It is expected that these systems will learn compositional and performative creative musical behaviors from both existing musical corpus and real-time interaction with performing musicians. Besides scientific publications, the resulting musical metacreations will be presented publicly both nationally and internationally, in traditional concert settings, public installations, and online web releases. Furthermore, the metacreations will be objectively validated through artist and audience feedback to determine their musical success. 

More concretely, the applicant work will focus on either: 
- Musical agents architecture: developing formal models and implementing musical agents integrating some novel elements of cognitive modeling, and/or machine learning. 
- Multi-agent musical metacreations: developing formal models and implementing multi-agent systems focusing on inter-agent and human-agent (non-verbal) communication and interaction. 

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Environment 
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The Musical Metacreation project is an interdisciplinary project founded by both the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada and the Canadian Council for the Arts. It brings together musicians, composers, cognitive scientists and AI researchers. 

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Requirements 
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Candidates are required to hold (or be about to complete) a graduate degree in Computer Science. Candidate are expected to be willing to work on formal as well as practical aspects, have good communication skills in English, and be able to demonstrate strong motivation to conduct research in an interdisciplinary context. 

Experience in cognitive modeling, agents and multiagent systems, machine learning and computer music programming, although not mandatory, will be considered favorably. 

All qualified candidates are encouraged to apply; however, Canadians and permanent residents will be given priority. Simon Fraser University is committed to employment equity and encourages applications from all qualified men and women, including visible minorities, aboriginal peoples and persons with disabilities. 

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Stipend 
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The annual salary is following the NSERC national standards of CAD$20,800 per year for the PhD and CAD$44,000 for the Postdoc. Workers' Compensation and Employment Standard Act benefits are included such as statutory holidays, Canada Pension and Unemployment Insurance. In addition, generous allowances are given to support presentation of work at international conferences and to attend seminars and tutorials. Scholarships are conditional on satisfactory progress, which is reviewed every year. 

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Deadline 
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Closing date for applications: November 22 , 2010 . 
More about SIAT: http://www.siat.sfu.ca/ 
More about the MAMAS laboratory: http://www.metacreation.net 

For further information contact Pr. Philippe Pasquier ( pasquier at sfu.ca ) 
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Assistant Professor 
School of Interactive Arts and Technology, 
Simon Fraser University, Vancouver, Canada. 
http://www.sfu.ca/pasquier 
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