SOFAIR Fellow​/SOFAIR Senior Fellow; UCL Grade 7 to Grade 10

• Full Time
• London
• Posted 6 days ago

Website:
University College of London

UCL’s Department of Computer Science (CS) is a top-ranked Computer Science Department in the UK. In the 2021 Research Excellence Framework () evaluation, UCL Computer Science was ranked second in the UK for research power and first in England.

This 12-month fellowship with the possibility of a multi-year extension unites interdisciplinary academic expertise to pursue fundamentally new foundation models, moving beyond incremental refinement of existing models. The fellow will help advance open, distributed, and trustworthy AI systems, positioning the UK at the centre of global efforts to shape the future of open AI. Ideally the fellow will be interested in innovation and spinouts.

SOFAIR is a consortium of leading academic researchers from across the UK, with partners Oxford, Cambridge and Edinburgh Universities, and led by UCL. The SOFAIR Lab will pursue fundamentally new AI architectures, moving beyond incremental refinement of existing models. By advancing open, distributed, and trustworthy AI systems, SOFAIR will extend the UK‑LLM initiative, stimulate innovation and spin‑outs, and position the UK at the centre of global efforts to shape the future of open AI.

Postholders will undertake internationally excellent research as members of SOFAIR’s interdisciplinary research programme, developing and testing original approaches to fundamental AI and contributing to the Lab’s collective research objectives.

In addition to the responsibilities of a Research Fellow, postholders appointed at Senior Research Fellow level will be expected to demonstrate substantial research independence and provide intellectual and strategic leadership. They will initiate and lead research programmes, shape SOFAIR’s scientific direction, develop collaborations and funding opportunities, mentor researchers, manage significant research resources, and contribute to the Lab’s governance and organisational development.

The UCL Centre for Artificial Intelligence hosts the EPSRC AI Hub in Generative Models as well as the UKRI Centre for Doctoral Training (CDT) in Foundational Artificial Intelligence.

UCL Department of Computer Science is one of the top research and teaching departments in the UK and has world-class standing. The department offers undergraduate and postgraduate Programmes and has an extensive research portfolio across a wealth of areas, from information security to complex systems.

See  University College London (UCL) is a multi-faculty college of the University of London with a population of over 40,000 students, from more than 130 different countries.

Degree programmes are provided in Arts and Humanities, Social and Historical Sciences, Architecture, Building, Environmental Design and Planning, Laws, Life Sciences and Clinical Sciences (including Medicine), Mathematical and Physical Sciences, and Engineering Sciences. For more information see

This post is advertised at UCL Grade 7 to Grade 10 dependent on relevant experience.

Grade 7 – Research fellow salary scale (£43,981-£54,019) inclusive of London Allowance.
Grade 8 – Senior Research Fellow salary scale (£56,431-£62,903) inclusive of London Allowance.
Grade 9 – (£68,284- £76,166) inclusive of London Allowance.
Grade 10 starting at £80,594 inclusive of London Allowance.

Funding for this post is available until 15th December 2027 in the first instance.

The role requires the post holder to research non-incremental advances in next generation foundation models. An imperative is that all ideas must be tested at scale to…