Data Scientist (m​/w​/d

Helmholtz-Zentrum Hereon

The Helmholtz-Zentrum Hereon conducts cutting-edge international research for a changing world:
Around 1,000 employees contribute to the tackling of climate change, the sustainable use of the world's coastal systems and the resource-compatible enhancement of the quality of life. From fundamental research to practical applications, the interdisciplinary research spectrum covers a unique range.

- 2026/KU 2

Location:

Geesthacht

Final date to receive applications: 03 September, 2026

Project start October 01, 2026 until September 30, 2028.

Air pollution remains one of the major environmental health challenges in urban areas. At the same time, observations are often sparse and unevenly distributed. In the AEON-UP project, we develop a transferable AI system for high-resolution urban air quality prediction across European cities and combine:

• physics-based chemistry transport models (CTMs)
• with probabilistic deep learning methods, in particular neural processes

to generate spatially resolved predictions of NO2, PM2.5, and ultrafine particles (UFP), including uncertainty estimates.

You will work on extending neural processes to large-scale, multimodal geospatial data, a setting that remains largely unexplored in current machine learning research.

You will join an interdisciplinary project team at the interface of environmental modelling and modern Al.

At Hereon, the research group combines:

• long-standing expertise in urban air quality modelling
• with growing activities in machine learning and data-driven methods

You will work closely with:

• Dr. Martin Ramacher (machine learning for environmental applications)
• Dr. Matthias Karl (urban air quality modelling and emissions) and collaborate within a Helmholtz-wide network with expertise in:
• Bayesian deep learning neural processes (Helmholtz Munich)
• air quality measurements and exposure science (RIFS Potsdam)

We value a collaborative, inclusive, and respectful working environment and actively encourage diverse perspectives in research.

Equal opportunity is an important part of our personnel policy. We would therefore strongly encourage qualified women to apply for the position. In principle, the full time position (39 h/week) is also shareable and limited to 2 years, starts at 1st of October 2026.

You will play a key role in the methodological development of the AEON-UP system.

• building the data infrastructure
• designing and implementing the neural-process architecture

while contributing to the overall modelling pipeline, evaluation, and transfer to new cities.

• you will develop scalable data pipelines for heterogeneous environmental datasets
• you will design and implement neural-process-based architectures for spatio-temporal prediction
• you will combine gridded CTM data and sparse observations in a unified probabilistic framework
• you will develop and evaluate uncertainty quantification methods
• you will train and scale models on HPC systems
• you will benchmark your approach against existing methods (e.g. XGBoost, Gaussian Processes)
• you will publish your work and contribute to open-source releases

• PhD in Machine Learning, Computer Science, Physics, Environmental Sciences, or a related field
• experience with deep learning frameworks (e.g. PyTorch)
• strong programming skills in Python
• intrinsic motivation to work on complex, real-world problems with societal relevance

• experience with probabilistic modelling/Bayesian methods
• experience with spatio-temporal or geospatial data
• experience with HPC
• an exciting and varied job in a research center with around 1,000 employees from more than 60 nations
• International Welcome Office with guest accommodation
• 6 weeks holiday per year; company holidays between Christmas and New Year's Day
• social benefits according to t...