Research Associate in Coastal Dynamic Management

Overview

Ulster University is hiring a Research Associate in Coastal Dynamic Management within the Belfast School of Architecture and the Built Environment. The position is based at the Belfast campus in the United Kingdom. This full-time, fixed-term role lasts for 12 months and is part of the project titled Coastal-Twin AI for Dynamic Shoreline Management, which is funded by the Natural Environment Research Council, UKRI. The initiative focuses on developing an artificial intelligence-enabled digital twin for coastal shoreline management in Northern Ireland to address the absence of a strategic Shoreline Management Plan amid increasing sea-level rise, wave action, and storm frequency.

What you get

The salary for this position ranges from 33,680 to 36,341 British Pounds per annum. The appointee will work on the technical pipeline of the project, which involves acquiring and harmonising coastal datasets, contributing to the development and validation of artificial intelligence models for shoreline detection and morphodynamics, integrating these models into a decision-support digital twin, and supporting reporting and human-in-the-loop workstreams. Additionally, a waiting list of 12 months may be created for the same or similar roles within the department or faculty, and the university may extend this waiting list across the institution.

Requirements

Applicants must hold a degree in Environmental Science, Geomatics, Civil or Coastal Engineering, or a closely related discipline. Candidates are also required to have a PhD that has been awarded or is near completion with the thesis submitted in a relevant area. Furthermore, applicants need experience in handling, processing, integrating, and analysing large-scale time-series and or geospatial environmental datasets, which includes uncertainty management, data quality assurance, and validation.

Key dates

The closing date for applications is 23rd November 2026 at 23:30.