PhD Researcher: Event-Based GNSS Receivers for Ultra-Low-Power Positioning

Organisation/Company Fundació per a la Universitat Oberta de Catalunya Research Field Engineering Mathematics Computer science Researcher Profile First Stage Researcher (R1) Positions PhD Positions Application Deadline 6 Nov 2026
- 23:59 (Europe/Madrid) Country Spain Type of Contract Temporary Job Status Full-time Hours Per Week 38,5 Offer Starting Date 1 Jan 2027 Is the job funded through the EU Research Framework Programme? Other EU programme Is the Job related to staff position within a Research Infrastructure? NoDescubra exactamente qué habilidades, experiencia y cualificaciones necesitará para tener éxito en este puesto antes de enviar su solicitud a continuación.
Offer DescriptionWould you like a job in which your talent really has an impact on your surroundings? The UOC is not simply a university: our institution is dynamic, determined and ambitious, and drives social and educational changes. Over 30 years ago, we made history as the world's first online university. Our goal is to generate, transfer and join together knowledge to build a more critical, responsible and non-conforming society.
We are seeking to recruit a Postdoctoral Researcher for UOC-TECH
- Research Centre in Ethical Technologies and Connectivity for Humanity at UOC, within the Wireless Networks (WiNe) research group.
WiNe is a young and highly motivated research team working on experimental wireless and networking systems, with a strong focus on translating fundamental research into working prototypes and real-world technologies.
You will work at the intersection of:GNSS and satellite navigationStatistical signal processing and estimationRF and receiver designEvent-based and neuromorphic computingAnalog and mixed-signal processingEmbedded and low-power systemsExperimental wireless systemsThe research environment combines theoretical research, software development, SDR experimentation, and hardware prototyping, providing opportunities to take ideas from mathematical models through to experimental systems.
Research ProjectGlobal Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) receivers traditionally rely on continuous, high-rate digital sampling followed by signal acquisition, correlation, synchronization, tracking, and navigation algorithms. While these architectures provide excellent performance, they can require substantial computation, data movement, and energy, particularly in battery-powered and resource-constrained devices.
This PhD project investigates a fundamentally different approach: event-driven GNSS processing.
Instead of continuously sampling and processing the GNSS waveform at a high rate, the receiver will generate and process sparse, information-bearing events that preserve the signal characteristics needed for synchronization, parameter estimation, and Position, Velocity and Time (PVT) computation.
The central scientific question is: How much of the information contained in a GNSS waveform needs to be represented and processed to achieve a given positioning performance, and can this information be extracted and processed as sparse asynchronous events rather than conventional high-rate digital samples?The project willinvestigate the theoretical foundations, algorithms, architectures, and experimental implementation of such receivers. The research will span the processing chain, from RF signal acquisition and signal representation to synchronization, tracking, statistical inference, and navigation.
The central hypothesis is that appropriately designed event-driven representations can substantially reduce data movement, computation, and energy consumption while maintaining the accuracy, robustness, and availability required for practical GNSS positioning.
The project combines statistical signal processing, estimation theory, GNSS receiver design, event-based sensing, analog and mixed-signal processing, neuromorphic computing, and low-power embedded systems.
The project aims to establish a scientific and experimental foundation for a new class of ultra-low-power GNSS receivers.
Expected outcomes include:New mathematical models for event-driven GNSS signal representations.
Novel signal-processing, estimation, and/or machine-learning algorithms.
Experimental implementations and proof-of-concept receiver architectures.
Quantitative comparisons with conventional GNSS processing.
Scientific publications in leading international conferences and journals.
Contributions to open-source software, datasets, or experimental platforms where appropriate.
A doctoral thesis establishing new knowledge in event-driven GNSS processing.
Opportunities for collaboration with international academic and industrial partners.
ResponsibilitiesThe predoctoral researcher will investigate several of the following research directions:Develop mathematical models for sparse and event-driven representations of GNSS signals and their relationship to conventional sampled representations.
Investigate event-driven methods for GNSS signal acquisition, synchronization, and tracking, including