THE UNIVERSITY OF BIRMINGHAM SCHOOL OF COMPUTER SCIENCE RESEARCH OPPORTUNITIES IN THEORETICAL COMPUTER SCIENCE The School of Computer Science, broadly grouped into areas of Theory of Computation, Artificial Intelligence, and Software Engineering, offers a number of PhD studentships each year. The Theory of Computation group concentrates on the development of logics and semantics for programming languages. The overall aim is to provide intuitive conceptual tools for the everyday practice of programming. Within this framework, the activities range from abstract mathematics to issues of implementation and software development. Current research projects include probabilistic computation and model checking, semantics for concurrent systems, observation logics, exact real number computation, semantics for databases, (linear) functional programming, type systems for optimization of programs, and automated deduction. Current members of the Theory group are: Dr Valeria de Paiva, Professor Achim Jung, Dr Marta Kwiatkowska, Dr Eike Ritter and Dr Mark Ryan. There are also two Research Fellows (Dr Natasha Alechina and Dr Neil Ghani) and 9 PhD students associated with the group, of the total of 30 in the School. Possible topics for research include, but are not restricted to: Probabilistic and stochastic systems Software verification Semantics for concurrency Extensions to the relational database model (theory and implementation) Semantics of object-oriented languages Linear abstract machines Type systems for imperative and OO programming Machine-assisted reasoning Categorical models of rewriting Applicants should possess a good honours degree (equivalent to an upper second class degree in a UK university) in Mathematics or Computer Science, or a closely related title. Applicants willing to undertake building software systems as part of their research are particularly encouraged. Informal enquiries can be directed to any member of the group: Valeria de Paiva +44 121 414 4766 Achim Jung +44 121 414 4776 Marta Kwiatkowska +44 121 414 7264 Eike Ritter +44 121 414 4772 Mark Ryan +44 121 414 7361 email {vdp,axj,mzk,exr,mdr}@cs.bham.ac.uk Additional information about the School of Computer Science and the University of Birmingham is accessible via WWW from URL: http://www.cs.bham.ac.uk