The High Performance Computing (HPC) research group, led by Professor Florina M. Ciorba in the Department of Mathematics and Computer Science at the University of Basel, Switzerland, is offering a fully funded PhD position as part of the SNF Bridge Discovery project “Family Gene Toolkit: A digital service to support genetic care in Europe.” This collaborative project brings together experts from Nursing (Prof. Maria C. Katapodi, University of Basel), Social Sciences and Health Issues (Prof. Maria Caiata-Zufferey, SUPSI), and High Performance Computing (Prof. Florina M. Ciorba, University of Basel), along with 14 clinical partners across Switzerland.

The Family Gene Toolkit (FGT) is a digital platform designed to provide reliable information and support for families affected by Hereditary Breast and Ovarian Cancer (HBOC) and Lynch Syndrome (LS). The platform prepares families for clinical consultations and shared decision-making, while also assisting clinicians in organizing long-term care and monitoring. The next phase, FGT v3.0, will integrate advanced AI technologies to enhance personalization for patients and improve clinical efficacy.

The selected PhD candidate will play a key role in building the secure technical foundation for FGT 3.0. Responsibilities include developing confidential HPC pipelines, scalable training infrastructure, and fine-tuning medical large language models (LLMs) using clinical guidelines, evidence-based datasets, and real-world medical corpora. The models will be evaluated with established medical and multilingual benchmarks to ensure robustness and clinical relevance.

This position is ideal for candidates with a strong background in artificial intelligence, security, and/or high performance computing, and a clear motivation to apply privacy-preserving and efficient computational methods to AI in genetic healthcare. The project offers a unique opportunity to work at the intersection of computer science, medical science, and clinical practice, contributing to the advancement of digital health platforms for cancer care.

The position is fully funded for 4 years (48 months) by the SNF Bridge Discovery project. The anticipated start date is April 2026. Applicants should hold a relevant degree and demonstrate experience or strong interest in HPC, AI, and secure computation. No specific GPA or language test requirements are mentioned.

To apply, visit the University of Basel job portal using the provided application link. Prepare your CV and supporting documents, and follow the instructions for submission. For further details, contact the research group or supervisors.