Research Associate in the Sensorimotor Augmentation for Human-Robot Collaboration

Job reference: SAE-029759

Salary: £37,694 - £46,049 per annum depending on relevant experience

Faculty/Organisational Unit: Science and Engineering

Location: RAICo One, Whitehaven, West Cumbria

Employment type: Fixed Term

Division/Team: Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering

Hours Per Week: Full Time (1 FTE)

Closing date (DD/MM/YYYY): 13/10/2025

Contract Duration: Starting as soon as possible for 18 months

School/Directorate: School of Engineering

We are looking for a full-time post-doctoral research associate to investigate human-robot collaboration to explore unstructured environments for inspection, repair, and maintenance. You will conduct research on designing artificial feedback to humans, whether they are remotely operating a robot or collaborating closely with one in a proximal setting. The robot’s perception about surroundings through multi-sensory feedback will be transmitted naturally to human operators to augment their situational awareness and facilitate their motor control. You will work with physical robot platforms and develop a feedback interface integrating human natural sensory and robot’s artificial information. This will encompass mechatronics design, system integration, robotic control, computer vision algorithms, and conducting user studies. You will be expected to publish at world-leading refereed conferences and journals, and demonstrate research outcomes on real robot platforms.

The role will also require regular contributions to a variety of academic tasks, including positively interacting and communicating with internal and external stakeholders, developing research proposals, management of research projects, supervising PhD, Master and undergraduate students, demonstrating research excellence and leadership to more junior members in the research lab.

Main Duties:

• Develop feedback interface to transmit useful information that is beyond human natural sensory channels.
• Design robot environment perception algorithms with multi-sensory feedback.
• Investigate optimal form of sensory feedback for human-robot collaborative exploration of unstructured environments.
• Develop robotic navigation and control algorithms.
• Implement algorithms into robotic systems for real-time execution.
• Work on the project deliverables through independent research and joint collaboration.
• Publish at world-leading refereed conferences and journals.
• Actively participate in the research programme of the Lab.
• Conduct and plan own scientific work proactively with appropriate supervision.
• Maintain accurate and complete records of all findings and experimental work, and full backup of research resources in the Lab facilities.

Location and Facility

The successful applicant will join in The University of Manchester’s team at RAICo One Facility in West Cumbria. The applicant will have a unique opportunity to work in close partnership with robotics, control and AI experts from the University of Manchester, Sellafield Ltd and the UK Atomic Energy Authority, applying their knowledge and research work into real applications. RAICo One is a fully equipped robotics laboratory with state-of-the-art robotic research and development facilities including a wide range of robotic systems and robot test arenas.

Enquiries about the vacancy, shortlisting and interviews:

Name: Dr. Xiaoxiao Cheng

Email: xiaoxiao.cheng@manchester.ac.uk

General enquiries:

Email: People.recruitment@manchester.ac.uk

Technical support:

https://jobseekersupport.jobtrain.co.uk/support/home

This vacancy will close for applications at midnight on the closing date.

Further particulars including job description and person specification are available on the University of Manchester website - click on the 'Apply' button above to find out more

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