PhD Position in AI-Supported Resilience Assessment of Climate-Neutral Transport Infrastructure
PhD Position in AI-Supported Resilience Assessment of Climate-Neutral Transport Infrastructure
100%, Zurich, fixed-term
The Chair of Infrastructure Management, led by Professor Dr. Bryan T. Adey within the Institute of Construction and Infrastructure Management of the Department of Civil, Environmental, and Geomatic Engineering, has an opening for a PhD student in transport infrastructure resilience. The position is part of the EU Horizon project SHIFTIN, which aims to accelerate the transition towards climate-neutral, resilient, and biodiversity-friendly transport infrastructure by 2050.
The doctoral research will focus on developing AI-supported stress-testing and surrogate-modelling methodologies to assess the resilience of interdependent transport infrastructure systems under climate-related and multi-hazard scenarios. The work will support rapid, evidence-based evaluation of design, retrofit, maintenance, and recovery strategies at asset, corridor, and network scales.
Project background
SHIFTIN is an EU Horizon project that aims to accelerate the transition towards climate-neutral, resilient, and biodiversity-friendly transport infrastructure by 2050. Roads, railways, and ports are essential for European mobility and economic activity, but they also consume large volumes of raw materials, generate greenhouse-gas and air-pollutant emissions, fragment habitats, and are increasingly exposed to climate-related hazards such as floods, landslides, and heatwaves.
To address these challenges, SHIFTIN will demonstrate and combine circular low-carbon construction materials, nature-based solutions, advanced monitoring technologies, and digital decision-support tools. Full-scale pilots on four TEN-T corridors will cover road, rail, and port contexts, integrating infrastructure monitoring, satellite and on-board sensing, IoT-enabled structural health monitoring, and AI-supported analytics.
A Digital Twin-based Integrated Decision Support Platform will convert monitoring and modelling outputs into transparent whole-life indicators for carbon, circularity, resilience, biodiversity, and costs. These outputs will support robust business cases, maintenance planning, green public procurement, and the wider uptake of sustainable and resilient infrastructure solutions across European transport networks.
Within this broader project, the PhD research will focus on AI-supported stress-testing and surrogate modelling for transport infrastructure resilience. The goal is to enable rapid assessment of many hazard, disruption, recovery, and intervention scenarios, supporting practical decision-making for climate-resilient and sustainable transport systems.
Job description
This doctorate aims to advance the state of the art in simulation-informed, AI-supported resilience assessment for transport infrastructure. Working closely with academic, industry, infrastructure, and public-sector partners across Europe, the candidate will contribute to the development of stress-testing frameworks, surrogate modelling algorithms, and decision-support tools for climate-resilient and sustainable transport systems. The candidate’s core tasks will include:
- Developing AI-supported surrogate models for infrastructure stress testing
- Linking surrogate models with agent-based and network-based simulations
- Assessing infrastructure interdependencies and recovery constraints
- Supporting resilience assessment across asset, corridor, and network scales
- Contributing to cost-benefit and decision-support analysis
- Addressing uncertainty, reliability, and explainability
- Integrating results with digital-twin and monitoring data
- Collaborating with the European project consortium
Profile
- A Master’s degree in civil engineering, transport engineering, infrastructure systems, environmental engineering, computational engineering, data science, or a closely related field
- Strong quantitative and programming skills, preferably in Python, with experience in machine learning, statistical modelling, simulation, optimisation, data analysis, or geospatial/network analysis
- Excellent written and spoken English skills
- Knowledge of German or another European language is an asset but not required
Workplace
Workplace
We offer
- Your job with impact: Become part of ETH Zurich, which not only supports your professional development, but also actively contributes to positive change in society
- You can expect numerous benefits, such as public transport season tickets and car sharing, a wide range of sports offered by the ASVZ, childcare and attractive pension benefits
We value diversity and sustainability
Curious? So are we.
We look forward to receiving your online application before 31 July 2026, with the following documents:
- A letter of interest describing your motivation for the position, relevant background, and initial ideas for potential doctoral research within the SHIFTIN project
- A curriculum vitae, including a list of publications if applicable, relevant research or professional experience, programming and analytical skills, and the contact information of at least two referees
- Transcripts of records for all university courses taken, together with copies of Bachelor’s and Master’s degree certificates or diplomas
- A copy of the Master’s thesis or a representative writing sample, if available
Further information about the Institute of Construction and Infrastructure Management can be found on our Website. Questions regarding the position should be directed to Ms. Nathalie Dietrich, dietrich@ibi.baug.ethz.ch (no applications).
Please note that we exclusively accept applications submitted through our online application portal. Applications via email or postal services will not be considered.
The screening of applications starts on 1st August 2026. Applications will be accepted until the position is filled.
The preferred starting date is 1st November 2026, although other dates are negotiable.