[Tccc] PhD position: vision substitution for blind people; University of Geneva, Switzerland

The Computer Vision and Multimedia Laboratory (http://vision.unige.ch)
and its Multimodal Interaction group (http://vision.unige.ch/MMI) is
hiring one PhD student. The laboratory participates to various national
and European research projects, and the Computing Science Center to which
the CVML belongs offers a rich and international environment.

Generally, the Multimodal interaction group (MMI) is interested in the
use of various modalities for human-computer interaction, such as visual
(eye-gaze tracking), auditory (3D sonification), haptic, and based on
the analysis of physiological signals (EEGs and peripheral). The main
research topics are currently:

* affective computing and emotions assessment;
* electronic aids for visually handicapped people.

Specifically, the new PhD student will work on the See ColOr project.
See ColOr is a multi-disciplinary development at the cross-road of
Computer Vision, Audio Processing and Pattern Recognition. The goal
is to achieve a non-invasive mobility aid for blind users that will
use the auditory pathway and possibly, the tactile pathway to represent
in real-time frontal image scenes. The main idea of See ColOr is the
coding of colours by musical instrument sounds, in order to emphasize
coloured objects and textures. Ideally, our targeted system will allow
visually impaired or blind subjects having already seen to build coherent
mental images of their environment. Targeted applications are the search
for objects that are of particular use for blind users, and the navigation
in an unknown environment. Interested persons will find more details in
this paper: http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=1496541 (click on the DOI
bookmark). Moreover, videos of experiments are available here:
http://www.youtube.com/guidobologna

Candidates should have a Master's degree in Computer Science or a closely
related field. They should have excellent programming skills, as well as
communication skills in English (and ideally in French). Knowledge or
interest
for image processing, audio spatialization, sonification and multi modal
interaction will be strongly appreciated.

The hired PhD Student, will:
- implement a new prototype which includes a perceptual module and an
alerting system;
- achieve new experiments on mobility and object search;
- present results on international conferences;
- publish results in scientific journals;
- participate in activities of the group and of the department.

Contract duration: 1 initial year, up to 4 years.

Starting date: as soon as possible.

Language:

Within our lab, most exchanges (written or oral) concerning research are
done
in English. Teaching is done in French and French is also the spoken
language
in Geneva. Good written and spoken knowledge of English is therefore
mandatory
and knowledge of French is an advantage.

Application:

Applications should include a curriculum vitae and two letters of reference.

The applicant should understand that the referees might be contacted. Please

send detailed applications by email to:

Dr. Guido Bologna
Guido.Bologna@unige.ch
Computer Vision & Multimedia Laboratory
Computer Science Department, University of Geneva
Battelle campus, Building A, Office 211
7, route de Drize, CH-1227 Carouge (Geneva), Switzerland

Related links:
* Computer Vision and Multimedia Lab: http://vision.unige.ch
* MMI group homepage: http://vision.unige.ch/MMI
* Computing Science Center (CUI) homepage: http://cui.unige.ch
* University of Geneva, Switzerland home page: http://www.unige.ch
* Geneva homepage : http://www.geneva.ch
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