ELLIS PhD Program attracts global AI talent to Europe: 120 early-career researchers join the network in 2024

The ELLIS PhD Program has once again set a new record: more than 3,160 interested candidates from around the globe responded to the 2023/2024 central recruitment call and registered on the application portal - an increase of roughly 60 percent compared to last year. Following a thorough evaluation process involving over 220 machine learning researchers from the ELLIS network, 120 excellent applicants were finally accepted into the program. For these talented individuals, a new chapter in their careers will soon begin. Supervised by some of the best academic and industrial AI scientists in Europe, they will work on cutting-edge research projects across a diverse spectrum of machine learning-related fields, and have the opportunity to expand their professional networks through exchanges within the ELLIS community.

In 2020, the ELLIS PhD Program was established with the aim of attracting and retaining outstanding young AI talent in Europe. While individual European universities may find it challenging to compete with top schools abroad in attracting exceptional candidates, collaboration among Europe's leading labs under the umbrella of a ‘European AI faculty’ offers significant benefits for both candidates and research institutions. On the central ELLIS application portal, candidates can browse numerous PhD opportunities in Europe and apply to multiple labs within the ELLIS network with a single application. Research institutions and advisors listed on the ELLIS application platform, on the other hand, benefit from greater visibility among international doctoral candidates.

Exchanges and training opportunities connect ELLIS PhD students and researchers across Europe

Once accepted into the program, each student is co-supervised by two researchers in the ELLIS community based in different European countries. Additionally, they conduct an exchange of at least six months with the international advisor. By pairing outstanding students with leading academic and industrial researchers, ELLIS enables young talent to learn from the best and become part of a European AI excellence network from an early stage. Machine learning-related research fields that ELLIS PhD students have access to range from computer vision, health and robotics to machine learning theory, privacy, natural language processing, sustainable topics like climate sciences and more. The program also offers various networking and training activities, such as summer schools and workshops.

Around 50 percent of applications came from outside Europe

The program has experienced a continuous increase in interest in recent years and reached a new record in the latest round, with more than 3,160 interested candidates registering on the application portal. Of all completed applications, approximately one quarter were submitted by female candidates, and around 50 percent came from candidates outside Europe. Following a multi-step evaluation and interview process, 120 exceptional applicants were admitted to the program as new PhD students, with more than 20 percent of them being female (see figure 1). Including the new cohort, the ELLIS PhD Program now counts a total of 422 PhD students.

“We are very excited to announce that 120 young researchers have successfully passed our rigorous selection process this year and will now have the opportunity to collaborate closely with some of Europe’s leading machine learning scientists. Welcome aboard the ELLIS network!”, says Florence d'Alché-Buc, Chair of the ELLIS PhD & Postdoc Committee.

“The fact that our program experiences increased interest year by year is a great motivation for us, and we are committed to continuously developing it further. One of our recent enhancements includes the introduction of a new interdisciplinary track, complementing our existing academic and industry tracks. We are especially eager to promote PhD topics at the crossroads of AI and sustainability, in relation to the European Lighthouse ELIAS”, she adds.

In addition to the academic track and the industry track, ELLIS students can now also choose a new interdisciplinary track designed to support PhD students and postdocs aiming to foster collaborations in two different research fields. These fields may include areas traditionally not associated with machine learning, such as law, biology, social sciences, or humanities.

The next opportunity to apply to the ELLIS PhD Program is approaching fast: The call for applications for the 2024/2025 round will be released in summer, with the central application portal opening at the beginning of October.
 

More information

Learn more about the ELLIS PhD Program here: ellis.eu/phd-postdoc

Watch the ELLIS PhD Program video and these short video testimonials recorded by some of our students across Europe to get an impression of what it’s like to be an ELLIS PhD student.

To stay up to date on the latest news about the program, follow ELLIS on X, LinkedIn, Mastodon and Facebook, and subscribe to the monthly ELLIS email newsletter.

The ELLIS PhD Program has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under ELISE Grant Agreement No. 951847 (2020 – 2024), and is continued with funding from the Horizon Europe research and innovation programme under ELIAS grant agreement number 101120237 (2023 – 2027). The program is also expanded by the EU-funded project ELSA under grant agreement number 101070617 (2022 – 2025).

Contact

Contact the ELLIS PhD Program at phd@ellis.eu.

 

Voices from the new 2023/2024 ELLIS PhD cohort
 

“I was fortunate to experience being part of a top research lab in the United States, and benefited from the collaborative, ambitious atmosphere. But my heart is in Europe, so I was thrilled to hear about the ELLIS mission to create and strengthen such environments closer to home. I’m excited about the unique opportunity to collaborate with other labs and researchers, and I believe this collaboration is key to valuable research as well as to my growth as a researcher.”

Felicia Körner, ELLIS PhD Student
Primary institution: LMU Munich, Germany

 

“I am Panagiotis Antoniadis and I will pursue a PhD on deep learning for protein function in the University of Copenhagen. I am very excited by the program’s emphasis on connecting young researchers to leading scientists creating a pan-European network that deals with cutting-edge fundamental problems in machine learning. Another aspect of the program that excites me a lot is its supervision model, which aligns perfectly with my research approach. Through my previous experiences, I have learned that I am more motivated in an environment fostering interdisciplinary collaboration and diverse perspectives."

Panagiotis Antoniadis, ELLIS PhD Student
Primary institution: University of Copenhagen, Denmark

 

“Throughout my master's studies, I had the privilege of collaborating with many exceptional ELLIS members. These experiences provide me first hand exposure to conducting interdisciplinary AI research and motivate me to envision myself one day becoming a part of this esteemed network. Through the ELLIS PhD program, I am passionate about pushing the frontiers of 3D computer vision and machine learning, while building connections with other researchers.”

Yuanwen Yue, ELLIS PhD Student
Primary institution: ETH Zurich, Switzerland

 

“ELLIS was always the top choice of graduate program for me owing to the diverse and flexible research scope that it offers. I'm really excited to brainstorm ideas with my supervisors, engage with the present and past ELLIS cohort, learn, contribute and develop myself into being a responsible researcher.”

Anisha Saha, ELLIS PhD Student
Primary institution: Saarland University, Germany



 

"ELLIS, with its vast and diverse network of research groups, greatly encourages interdisciplinary research and facilitates its members to expand their work into other domains. I am looking forward to utilizing these facilities to get inspiration from other subjects, find applications of my work beyond my field, and collaborate with other scientists."

Pulkit Goyal, ELLIS PhD Student
Primary institution: University of Innsbruck, Austria


 

“My name is José Pombal, I am Portuguese, and I will be starting my ELLIS Industrial PhD under professor André Martins at Instituto Superior Técnico and Unbabel. I plan to work on the evaluation of language models, with a focus on multilingual applications (e.g. machine translation).

There are two main reasons for my joining ELLIS:
1. I am strongly aligned with the goal of ELLIS to create the best academic network in the world, and I truly believe that Europe's students and institutions are capable of reaching this goal.
2. The ELLIS network is composed of truly talented individuals — in both the faculty and student bodies.

The ELLIS program builds on other graduate programs by connecting several institutions and people across different environments. I hope to learn a lot from all these researchers with such diverse backgrounds and ideas. As far as I can see, a crucial part of an impactful PhD is being able to connect with other talented people and make fruitful collaborations, which the ELLIS program facilitates and incentivizes.”

José Pombal, ELLIS PhD Student
Primary institution: Instituto Superior Técnico, Portugal