Roma Tre University (Rome, Italy) opens to foreign students a competition for 2 positions in the PhD course in Computer Science and Automation of the Doctoral School in Engineering with a fellowship of 13.638,47 EUR (gross amount per year). Extra funding is available for participation in international conferences, schools, and workshops.

The PhD program aims at preparing first class researchers and future leaders in Computer Engineering, Automation and Robotics who will either continue the research career, both in Universities and in research centers, or will lead industrial research and development projects. A Faculty of internationally recognized researchers and professors from the Department of Informatics and Automation (DIA) of Roma Tre University is responsible for the educational activities and takes part in the organization of the doctoral program.

The course covers a three-year period. The first year is mainly devoted to deepening the background of each student with introductory courses covering the relevant topics in the research areas of the PhD program and advanced courses illustrating new results and techniques in specific fields. These courses aim to facilitate students in choosing the PhD research topic. The second and third years are devoted to research with emphasis on active participation in the research projects of DIA, attendance to conferences, schools and seminars, publication of papers in journals and conference proceedings, and the preparation of the final thesis. Usually, each student spends a period of six months in an international research center. The research areas of the PhD program span the whole spectrum of the department research programs, which are the following:

(1) AUTOMATION AND INDUSTRIAL ORGANIZATION: this program focus on the development of models, methods and tools for the efficient utilization of resources. The theoretical background is in the fields of Operations Research and Control Theory, and more specifically in discrete optimization, complexity theory and discrete event systems. The research activities include the development of algorithms in this context, agent-oriented decentralized management systems, complexity analysis production management, production planning, scheduling, capacity planning, sequence coordination, and sequencing games.

(2) ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE: the program relates to AI models, methods and tools and their applications to create extremely flexible, autonomous, adaptive and reliable systems, well-grounded from a theoretical point of view. The program's research projects particularly focus on the formal base and theoretical grounds, both regarding the use of exploration and empirical experimental techniques to analyze, create and assess the conceived systems.

(3) NETWORK ANALYSIS AND VISUALIZATION: the general goal of this program is to develop new methodologies and tools for network analysis and visualization, with applications to computer network discovery and management. Given the great research opportunities offered by the new generation computer networks, the focus of the program progressively embodied, together with the visualization and analysis problems, pure computer networks research topics.

(4) DATABASES AND INFORMATION SYSTEMS: the general goal of the database program is the study of new principles, methods and tools for the organization and management of information, in the form of databases, that is, systematic collections of data that are large, persistent, and shared. The current focus of the program is on the new requirements generated by the growth of the Internet and WWW, with the possible availability of different and heterogeneous sources of information. The program includes various projects in each of which the attention is both on principles and on experimentation.

(5) COMPUTER-AIDED DESIGN: the mission of this program is to pursue research on geometric modeling and visual simulation of engineering problems using CAD/PLM technologies. The group has concentrate its efforts on the following areas: functional programming with design languages, parallel and distributed processing, geometric and solid modeling, computer-aided design and computer graphics for scientific visualization, and geometrical and physical modeling of bio-systems.

(6) ROBOTICS: the robotics program is mainly focused on methodologies and technologies for sensor based navigation of cooperating autonomous vehicles in partially structured environments. Research interests include: processing of sensors data for the purpose of localization, motion planning, and environmental mapping, modelling and control of mobile robots with lightweight manipulators, development of distributed control and estimation techniques, and modelling of complex interconnected systems.

The competition is open to students who:

(i) are not Italian citizens; (ii) are not residents of Italy; (iii) have gained (or will gain before 31 August 2008) an university degree or an equivalent degree of a higher education institution giving him/her access to doctoral studies without any further qualifications in the country where it was obtained. The equivalence of the degree with the Italian "Laurea Specialistica/Magistrale" will be evaluated by the Supervising Committee of the selected course;

Students who already obtained a doctoral degree are not eligible.

Applications should be sent exclusively by Web, filling the form (including the upload of the requested documents in pdf format) available on-line at the address: http://host.uniroma3.it/uffici/ricerca/

The EXPIRATION DATE of the application is: 25 August 2008 (h. 24.00).

The selection of candidates will be carried out by the Supervising Committee. Candidates will be selected on the basis of:

- (mandatory) university (or equivalent) degree - (mandatory) abstract of the final thesis - (mandatory) list of passed examinations - (mandatory) curriculum vitae et studiorum - (mandatory) a proposed research project - (mandatory) at least three reference letters provided and signed by relevant members of the international scientific community, relating to the candidate's chosen course; - (if any) additional document and/or publication (including GRE - Graduate Record Examination - test) that the candidate deems worthy of consideration, including associations to research institutions (MAX 05 documents).

This selection will produce a pass-list, and suitable candidates will be contacted with an official notification, that will be sent by e-mail before 30 September 2008. To be admitted to the course the candidates shall deliver:

- formal documentation of qualifications as outlined in the application form; - formal declaration of acceptance.

Only on receiving this documents they will be enrolled to the course (starting 2008, November 01).

Doctorate Fellowships are incompatible with any other one granted by Italian or International subjects. Doctorate Fellowships cannot be awarded to candidates who have already (either entirely or partially) benefited from a similar grant to attend a Ph.D. Course provided by an Italian University.

For any other information send an e-mail to dottorat@uniroma3.it