PhD in Co-design and Adoption of European Digital Twin Infrastructure for Living Environments Eindhoven University of Technology in Netherlands

PhD opportunity at Eindhoven University of Technology (TU/e) in co-design and adoption of European digital twin infrastructure for living environments.

This PhD is part of the Horizon Europe project AiGENT (AI-enabled digital twin infrastructure for health and living environments). The project examines how AI-enabled infrastructures can be designed and adopted in ways that are not only technically robust, but also socially acceptable, trustworthy, fair, and transferable across countries and domains.

The research will focus on evaluating and structuring co-design processes in a large international European consortium. You will study how participatory approaches shape legitimacy, stakeholder value, fairness, bias, access, power relations, and adoption dynamics in different national contexts. The work includes designing and analysing evaluation workshops and cross-domain focus groups in three pilot countries, engaging researchers, construction industry actors, housing portfolio managers, policy actors, and residents.

The position is embedded in the chair of urbanism at TU/e’s Department of Built Environment and involves close collaboration with academic and technical partners across Europe, including Cem Ataman, Liesbet Geris (VPH – The Society for In Silico Medicine), and developer teams from VITO, VTT, CERTH, and FORTH.

Eligible backgrounds include urbanism, urban studies, geography, planning, information systems, or related fields. The post specifically welcomes candidates who can move between disciplinary frames and who are interested in the impact of digital technologies on housing and living environments. Experience with participatory design, stakeholder engagement, urban data systems, AI-enabled information models, and basic computational analysis tools such as Python is expected or strongly preferred.

Funding and conditions: full-time PhD employment for four years, with salary according to Dutch university scale P (€3,059–€3,881 per month), plus holiday allowance, year-end bonus, and standard employment benefits. Teaching duties are included as part of the appointment.

Application deadline: 12 June 2026. Apply online through the TU/e vacancy page; submit a cover letter, CV, and two references. Applications sent by email or post will not be processed.