Research Master / potential PhD in Civil / Geotechnical Engineering at UCC

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Project title:  CERN Tunnel Infrastructure Monitoring and Deterioration Detection using Machine Learning

Supervision team: Zili Li (UCC) and John Osborne (the European Centre for Nuclear research (CERN))

Project description:

Recent advance in Information and Communications Technology (ICT) has great potential to optimise structural health monitoring in a smarter manner. This project aims to use innovative Distributed Fibre Optic Sensing (DFOS) and machine learning approach for monitoring ageing tunnel infrastructures at European Centre for Nuclear research (CERN), where 27 kilometres of deep tunnels were excavated decades ago lined with spray shotcrete in a weak sedimentary rock. The innovative structural health monitoring methods will evaluate the tunnel serviceability for particle collision testing in Large Hadron Collider (LHC), and meanwhile may potentially reveal long-term soil-tunnel interaction mechanism in a greater depth than conventional methods for the optimization of tunnel design and maintenance.

he successful candidate will be registered at University College Cork, starting as soon as possible in early June 2019. The stipend is 18,000 euros in UCC for the first year and ca. 31,000 euros in CERN for the second year, with a contribution to tuition fees available for at least two years.

Candidate Experience: The candidate should have a minimum 2.1 in an honours Bachelor’s degree in Civil Engineering, or an equivalent standard from an overseas university. All applicants whose first language is not English must provide evidence of English language proficiency (e.g. IELTS or TOEFL) according to UCC entry requirement.  Some experience in structural health monitoring and machine learning for civil / geotechnical engineering would be an advantage.
Application: Please e-mail a CV (max. 2 pages) and a cover letter outlining your experience and motivation to Dr. Zili Li (zili.li@ucc.ie). Intended start date is June 2019.