Senior level preferred (but not limited to)
Host laboratory: The Biomedical Imaging Laboratory (Laboratoire d’Imagerie Biomédicale = LIB), affiliated with INSERM / CNRS / Sorbonne University.
Sorbonne Université – Campus des Cordeliers; 15 rue de l’Ecole de Médecine; 75006 Paris, France and Pitié-Salpetriere Hospital, 75013 Paris, France
Duration and the starting date: 24 months (12 + 12), full time employment, starting May 2026
Application deadline: Feb 28, 2026 (if a good candidate is found earlier, we won’t accept more applications, so don’t wait until the last moment)
Qualifications expected: PhD degree in Computational Neuroscience. Ideally with 2+ years after PhD
Context: The VirtuALS project funded by French ALS association (ARSLA) aims to improve the diagnosis and treatment of Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) by developing a personalized « Digital Twin » of an ALS patient brain. Our group has access to a large (~400 patients) dataset of multimodal neuroimaging and clinical data from ALS patients. By integrating multimodal patient data (MRI, DTI, fMRI, EEG/MEG) into biophysical network models of The Virtual Brain (TVB) type, we aim to mechanistically explain patient heterogeneity and identify prognostic biomarkers.
This is a high-impact, interdisciplinary project bridging together clinical neurology, neuroimaging, and computational modeling.
Postdoc Mission:
Lead the project efforts in close interaction with on-site neurologists experienced in ALS, experts in Clinical and Computational Neuroscience and off-site experts in The Virtual Brain (in particular, Spase Petkoski at INSERM / Aix Marseille University).
Key responsibilities:
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Fitting TVB models to the multimodal patient neuroimaging data constrained by patient’s structural connectivity and tractography
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Using the results of the TVB model fits to stratify patients and predict disease progression
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Organizing and unifying the data (includes supervision of master students to help with this task) in close collaboration with experts who participated in the data collection
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Publishing the results of the research in a clinical neuroscience journal; present the research at both ALS and computational conferences
Required skills: strong experience in whole brain modeling using dynamical systems (ideally TVB), experience in fitting models to human data, strong level of autonomy, solid knowledge of machine learning and/or statistics, Linux
Desired skills: strong track record of papers on whole brain modeling, experience working with EEG (and/or MEG), fMRI, MRI + DTI (including tractography), simulation-based inference, experience using HPCs, master student supervision experience, github. Also would be an advantage: experience working with clinical scientists, understanding of ALS physiopathology, decent level of French (to better interact with clinicians and have access to a wider pool of master students).
We offer:
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A stimulating, interdisciplinary research environment in the very center of Paris. Close collaboration with the core developers of The Virtual Brain (Systems Neuroscience Institute, Marseille) and leading ALS clinicians.
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Access to a dedicated local compute server and large, curated clinical datasets.
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Salary adjusted for research experience (following French public research salary grids)
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Opportunities for high-impact publications and career development in the rapidly growing field of digital health and computational medicine
Host lab description: Biomedical Imaging Laboratory concentrates experts in different modalities of biomedical imaging, including a large team on neuroimaging. It includes permanent researchers with ample experience in MEG/EEG data analysis, BCIs, signal processing, deep learning for brain imaging analysis, biomedical statistics, dynamical systems and research on motor control. The lab has two locations: one in the very center of Paris (10 min walking from the Notre Dame de Paris cathedral, the postdoc will work mainly there) and one in Pitié-Salpetriére hospital in the rehabilitation department. LIB has ample collaborations with other neuroscience institutions in Paris and with Systems Neuroscience Institute (Institut de Neurosciences des Systèmes) in Marseille. The principal investigator has extensive experience in computational neuroscience (but not with TVB), the wider team has a long tracker record in ALS research.
How to apply: send an email to the PI email below, attaching 1) CV, 2) PDF of your most relevant paper on whole brain modeling 3) link to your github repo. A motivation letter is not strictly required, but would strongly increase your chances if your CV is not a perfect fit (if you are not sure, just send the application without the letter and it will be requested it if necessary). If you do provide a motivation letter, it should explain why you are interested in this position and why you are a good fit for it (note that applications with naively LLM-generated motivation letters will be discarded completely). Two reference letters will be requested if the candidate passes the initial screening.
The selection process will involve 1) offline CV filtering 2) a short informal videocall for a pre-interview 3) a longer video/in person interview with the main PI 4) a final interview together with a TVB expert and an ALS expert
Before applying make sure to check the last version of this document online: https://sdrive.cnrs.fr/s/Lcp3L3Xb2ZQ2xpm
Contact of the PI: Dmitrii Todorov, PhD; Chaire de Professeur Junior (Assistant Professor) at INSERM; dmitrii.todorov #at$ inserm.fr
Head of Computational Neuroscience of Motor System research group (CoNeMot),
part of Neural Connectivity and Plasticity (NCP) team.
