Professor in Artificial Intelligence in Cardiovascular Healthcare

Professor in Artificial Intelligence in Cardiovascular Healthcare

(ref. ZAP-2022-133)

Last modification : Wednesday, February 15, 2023

In the Science, Engineering and Technology Group of KU Leuven, Faculty of Engineering Science, Department of Electrical Engineering (ESAT), research unit ESAT-STADIUS and the Biomedical Sciences Group, Faculty of Medicine, Department of Cardiovascular Sciences, there is a shared 50%-50% academic vacancy in the area of artificial intelligence in cardiovascular healthcare. We are looking for internationally oriented candidates with an excellent interdisciplinary research record and with educational competence. ESAT- STADIUS (STADIUS Center for Dynamical Systems, Signal Processing and Data Analytics) (www. esat.kuleuven.be/stadius/) is a research unit in the Department of Electrical Engineering (ESAT) (www. esat.kuleuven.be) of KU Leuven (www. kuleuven.be), joining educational and research activities of 15 senior academic staff and around 100 PhD and postdoctoral researchers. ESAT- STADIUS pursues excellence in an explicit and synergistic combination of fundamental and applied research: With core concepts from linear and multi- linear algebra, statistics, optimization, machine learning, and artificial intelligence, its fundamental research is focused on the development of mathematical engineering tools and numerical algorithms. Building upon this foundation, applied research is geared towards putting these tools and algorithms into motion in order to advance the current state of technology across a wide range of relevant application fields, including industrial automation and control, speech and audio signal processing, digital communications, biomedical data analysis and signal processing, bioinformatics and systems biology. ESAT-STADIUS attracts competitive research funding through regional, national and European funding channels, such as the European Research Council ERC (www. esat.kuleuven.be/stadius/projects.php). In addition, ESAT-STADIUS has a large number of collaborative projects with industry, which has also resulted in several spin-off companies (www. esat.kuleuven.be/stadius/spinoffs.php). The Department of Cardiovascular Sciences aims to increase knowledge in cardiovascular biology and diseases, to implement translation from bench to bedside and to improve patient care and cardiovascular health. The research in the Department of Cardiovascular Sciences includes exploratory basic research, clinical and population studies, and diagnostic and technological innovation in the broad field of cardiovascular diseases. The different Research Units excel in their specific expertise. Animal and human research projects extend across the departmental matrix of research tracks. The Research Units all contribute to six major research tracks within the Department: (1) heart, (2) vessel, (3) blood, (4) cardiovascular health, (5) clinical care and patient management, and (6) imaging and diagnostics. The Department has 300 collaborators in the different research and clinical cardiovascular disciplines with more than 70 senior academic staff members, 200 researchers and clinicians (of whom 100 are PhD researchers) and 40 support staff members (https: // gbiomed.kuleuven.be/english/research/50000635/index.html).

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Duties Research

You establish an internationally relevant research program in the area of artificial intelligence (AI) and the use of multi-modal data in cardiovascular healthcare, theoretical but mainly application-oriented, and based on data-driven and/or physiologically inspired models. This research program can take several directions (non-exhaustive, non-restrictive list):

AI-assisted health data ingestion and wrangling, time series analysis, data quality assessment and enhancement, and automatic feature generation for extracting digital biomarkers, with a focus on automation and robustness (with regard to missing data, artifacts, uncertainty).

Novel analytical procedures relevant for extracting insights from mobile and/or wearable sensors in order to prevent (healthy cardiac aging), diagnose and/or treat heart diseases and predict events in cardiovascular patients.

Big data analysis, trusted and explainable deep/machine learning for cardiac decision support and therapeutic efficacy assessment.

Large-scale data integration coping with a wide range of data types, including low-level signals (multi-omics), time-series (ECG, PPG, accelerometry, …), multi-lead ECG, cardiac images (echocardiography, cardiac MRI), structured and unstructured patient records, tabular data and relational databases.

Applications in a clinical context and ambulatory long-term monitoring, preventive healthcare, personalized cardiovascular medicine, and improved diagnostic intelligence for decision support.

For the execution of the research, you rely on (and contribute to) well- founded expertise within ESAT-STADIUS on artificial intelligence techniques, in particular data-driven modelling, large-scale signal and time series analysis, biomedical data processing, machine/deep learning, statistics, multi-omics, signal processing, etc., and the extensive clinical expertise within the Department of Cardiovascular Sciences, in particular on cardio- genetics, cardiac arrhythmia, cardiovascular imaging, heart failure/transplantation and adult congenital heart disease. Both groups have a longstanding cooperation in cardiorespiratory monitoring, big-data-based cardiovascular diagnostics and cardiovascular risk prediction.

The research is also embedded in interdisciplinary research institutes and programs, e.g., KU Leuven Institute for Artificial Intelligence (Leuven.AI) and the Flanders AI Impulse Program.

Within this targeted area of research, your research program provides evidence of originality and promise. You will strive for excellence in your scholarly research: publish at the highest academic level, initiate national and international collaboration, obtain competitive research funding, attract and supervise doctoral students. You endorse the international research strategy and contribute to the further strengthening of the scientific reputation of ESAT-STADIUS and the Department of Cardiovascular Sciences by taking a key role in the network of scientific and international collaborations in the aforementioned research domain.

Education

You are willing to provide high-quality teaching in the Bachelor and/or Master programs of the KU Leuven Faculty of Engineering Science and Faculty of Medicine, particularly in the Master of Biomedical Engineering and Master of Artificial Intelligence programs, with a clear commitment to the quality of the program as a whole.

You will also contribute to the university's pedagogical project by supervising master's theses and as a supervisor of PhD candidates.

You develop your teaching in accordance with the vision of KU Leuven on activating, blended and research-based instruction and make use of the opportunities offered by the university to further professionalize your teaching.

Service

You are prepared to provide scientific, social and internal services.

You provide advice and support for clinical and preclinical research projects in collaboration with the researchers and the PhD candidates of the various research groups within the Department of Cardiovascular Sciences and associated clinical divisions.

You are part of a taskforce within the Department that develops, documents and optimizes data gathering from hospital information systems according to current legal frameworks.

Profile

You have a PhD in Engineering Sciences (Electrical Engineering, Biomedical Engineering, Computer Science) or an equivalent degree.

You have a strong interdisciplinary research profile within the aforementioned research domain and have international research experience. The quality of your research is proven by publications in international leading journals and conferences.

You have demonstrable qualities related to academic teaching. Teaching experience is an asset.

You possess organisational skills and have a cooperative attitude.

You also possess leadership capacities within an interdisciplinary university context.

Proficiency in English is required.

The official language used at KU Leuven is Dutch. If you do not speak Dutch (or do not speak it well) at the start of employment, KU Leuven will provide language training to enable you to take part in meetings.Before teaching courses in Dutch or English, you will be given the opportunity to learn Dutch, respectively English, to the required standard.

Offer

We offer full-time employment in an intellectually challenging environment.

KU Leuven is a research-intensive, internationally oriented university that conducts both fundamental and applied academic research. It has a strong interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary focus and strives for international excellence. To this end, it collaborates actively with its research partners in Belgium and abroad. It offers its students an academic education based on high-level scholarly research.

You will work in Leuven, a historic, dynamic and lively city located in the heart of Belgium, within 20 minutes from Brussels, the capital of the European Union, and less than two hours from Paris, London and Amsterdam.

Depending on your record and qualifications, you will be appointed to or tenured in one of the grades of the senior academic staff: assistant professor, associate professor, professor or full professor. In principle, junior researchers are appointed as assistant professor on the tenure track for a period of 5 years; after this period and a positive evaluation, they are permanently appointed (or tenured) as an associate professor.

KU Leuven is well equipped to welcome foreign professors and their family and provides practical support with regard to immigration & administration, housing, childcare, learning Dutch, partner career coaching, etc.

Interested?

For more information, please contact:

o Prof. dr. ir. Georges Gielen, Chairman Department of Electrical Engineering (ESAT) ([email protected], +32 16 32 40 76)

o Prof. dr. ir. Toon van Waterschoot, Head of Division ESAT-STADIUS ([email protected], +32 16 32 17 88)

o Prof. dr. Werner Budts, Chairman Department of Cardiovascular Sciences ([email protected], +32 16 32 16 64)

o Prof. dr. Rik Willems, Department of Cardiovascular Sciences ([email protected], +32 16 33 05 61)

You can submit your application only through our online application system. If you have problems submitting your application online, please contact: [email protected]

Add to your application the following documents (more information is available on the KU Leuven job site):

Your biosketch in which you indicate your added value as an academic for research, education and service to society of your past career and of your future activities (maximum 2 pages);

A file on your five most important publications or realizations;

An extensive cv including a full publication list.

KU Leuven is committed to creating a diverse environment and is therefore an equal opportunity employer. It explicitly encourages candidates from groups that are currently underrepresented at the university to submit their applications.

KU Leuven places great importance on research integrity and ethical conduct and will therefore ask you to sign an integrity statement upon appointment.

KU Leuven seeks to foster an environment where all talents can flourish, regardless of gender, age, cultural background, nationality or impairments. If you have any questions relating to accessibility or support, please contact us at [email protected]