Senior Researcher in AI Global River Systems

UK date and time: 13-September-2026 04:34

School of Geography and the Environment, South Parks Road, Oxford, OX1 3QY

The School of Geography and the Environment is seeking a Senior Researcher to lead the technical delivery of EARTHFLOW-AI:
Global River Dynamics via Artificial Intelligence, a NERC-funded project developing the first observation-driven, AI-ready global river data infrastructure.

Reporting to Professor Louise Slater, you will lead research combining large-scale Earth observation data, global hydrography and advanced machine learning. The project will integrate measurements from the SWOT satellite mission with Oxford's Global River Topology (GRIT) hydrography to develop verified, uncertainty-aware predictions of river flow direction and connectivity.

You will lead the development of scalable and reproducible data and machine-learning pipelines, upgrade the GRIT global hydrography, and design and evaluate models ranging from baseline approaches to graph neural networks. You will also oversee the open release of project datasets, models, code and documentation.

The successful candidate will join Oxford's Hydro-Climate Extremes research group and work closely with Dr Xiaowen Dong (Department of Engineering Science), Dr Michel Wortmann, and project partners at ECMWF, Google Research and the Environment Agency. The position includes travel to partner organisations and international conferences, with opportunities to lead publications and contribute to project decision-making.

We are seeking an experienced researcher who holds a relevant PhD/DPhil with post-qualification research experience and a strong lead-author publication record. You will have excellent Python and research software engineering skills, experience working with large-scale geospatial datasets and high-performance or cloud computing, and demonstrated expertise in advanced machine learning. Experience leading research projects, managing budgets and coordinating or supervising others is also essential.

This is an opportunity to lead technically ambitious research applying AI and Earth observation to the development of a new global understanding of river systems.

full-time, fixed-term basis until 31 March 2028 with possibility of extension, if funding permits. The start date is as soon as possible.

As an employer, we genuinely care about our employees’ well-being, and this is reflected in the range of benefits that we offer including:

• 38 days annual leave
• A comprehensive range of childcare services
• Family leave schemes
• Discounted bus travel and Season Ticket travel loans.

The closing date for applications is
12.00 noon (UK time) on 5 October 2026
.Only applications submitted by this time will be considered.

The University of Oxford and The School of Geography and the Environment are Silver Athena SWAN holders. Applications are particularly welcome and encouraged from women, black, and minority ethnic candidates, who are under-represented in posts in The School of Geography and the Environment. The School of Geography and the Environment are committed to equality and values diversity