Research Assistant or Associate in Software Engineering and Surgical Imaging

Post overview:

• Focus: Support surgical imaging data analysis tasks and work on computational algorithms to help streamline data annotation
• Line manager: Tom Vercauteren
• Salary: Grade 5, £38,482 - £43,249 or Grade 6, £44,355 – £47,882 (max SP34) per annum including LWA depending on experience
• Duration: Fixed term contract until 30 Sep 2025

About Us

About the research group:

The CAI4CAI group, led by Prof Tom Vercauteren, is an academic research group focusing on Contextual Artificial Intelligence for Computer Assisted Interventions. Our engineering research aims at improving surgical and interventional sciences by exploiting learning-based approaches for multi-modal reasoning. We take a multidisciplinary, collaborative approach to solve clinical challenges.

About the department:

The mission of the Department of Surgical & Interventional Engineering (SIE) within the School of Biomedical Engineering & Imaging Sciences (BMEIS) is to bring together engineering and clinical experts to develop new surgical and interventional technologies for a wide range of clinical applications with a focus on combining diagnostic information to support image-guidance during procedures. The department boasts unique world-class facilities for SIE research. Our Validation Suite is a unique combination of an Integration Room, a versatile laboratory space where researchers can setup complex novel medical systems into fully integrated platforms, and an Intervention Room, a state-of-the-art simulated operative theatre where the technology can be deployed and tested on post-mortem models in a realistic surgical environment.

About the University:

King’s College London is an internationally renowned university delivering exceptional education and world-leading research. We are dedicated to driving positive and sustainable change in society and realising our vision of making the world a better place.

About The Role

We are seeking to recruit research software engineers to help translate the next generation of AI-assisted imaging systems for surgical guidance. The postholder, based within the Department of Surgical & Interventional Engineering at King’s College London, will play a key role in collaborative projects with King’s College Hospital. The role will involve supporting two ongoing clinical neurosurgery study. The successful candidates will join the clinical study team to help curate high-quality data.

The postholders will help support data analysis tasks and work on computational algorithms to help streamline data annotation. Image computing activities involve expanding on interactive segmentation algorithms to accelerate data annotation. The recruited individuals will complement our multidisciplinary team, undertake research in computer-assisted intervention, and consolidate our existing software infrastructure.

The post involves close and active collaboration with the surgical team, researchers, and engineers. The candidate will work closely with the rest of the team to correlate surgical data with other rich clinical data sources (e.g. surgical microscopy, histopathology).

This is a full-time post (35 hours per week), and you will be offered a fixed term contract until 30 Sep 2025.

About you

To be successful in this role, we are looking for candidates to have the following skills and experience:

Essential criteria

• BSc/ MSc degree in computer vision or a closely related field
• PhD in relevant subject area or equivalent industry experience (for Grade 6) at or near completion*
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills
• Experience of software development with Python
• Experience of machine learning with PyTorch
• Good knowledge of machine learning and computer vision algorithms
• Ability to work on own initiative and in a team
• Experience in collaborative software development (for Grade 6)

Desirable criteria

• Understanding of translational research requirements for surgical imaging research

Downloading a copy of our Job Description Full details of the role and the skills, knowledge and experience required can be found in the Job Description document, provided here and after you click “Apply Now”. This document will provide information of what criteria will be assessed at each stage of the recruitment process.

Further Information

We pride ourselves on being inclusive and welcoming. We embrace diversity and want everyone to feel that they belong and are connected to others in our community. We are committed to working with our staff and unions on these and other issues, to continue to support our people and to develop a diverse and inclusive culture at King’s.

We ask all candidates to submit a copy of their CV, and a supporting statement, detailing how they meet the essential criteria listed in the advert. If we receive a strong field of candidates, we may use the desirable criteria to choose our final shortlist, so please include your evidence against these where possible.

To find out how our managers will review your application, please take a look at our ‘How we Recruit’ pages on the King’s website.

More information about the position and how to apply here or here.