PhD Position - Formal Engineering Methods for Digital Twin Development

Position Overview

We are seeking a motivated PhD candidate to contribute to the Engineering Digital Twins (EDT) program within Catalyst: the Reliable Hybrid Model Forge. The research focuses on developing formal engineering processes, methods, and tools for the reliable development of digital twins.

Digital twins emulate the behavior of complex heterogeneous systems throughout their entire lifecycle, including design, implementation, operation, and decommissioning. These systems typically involve a combination of physical, cybernetic, human, and sometimes biological components, interacting within dynamic operational contexts.

Developing such digital twins requires multi-physics and multi-scale models, often built using different modeling paradigms. Ensuring the fidelity of these models is critical because digital twins may support safety-critical decisions. Consequently, Verification, Validation, and Uncertainty Quantification (VVUQ) play a central role in the engineering process.

While formal engineering methods are widely used for system design in domains such as transportation, they currently do not scale well to digital twins, where models of physical environments, human interactions, and operational contexts must also be integrated.

This PhD aims to extend formal engineering techniques to enable scalable, rigorous development of digital twins composed of heterogeneous modeling paradigms.

Research Focus

The development of digital twins requires the integration of models describing different aspects of a system and its environment. These models may rely on distinct modeling paradigms and verification methods.

The PhD will investigate formal engineering methods addressing the following key challenges:

• Formal modeling paradigm composition
  Designing operators and frameworks allowing the formal composition of heterogeneous modeling paradigms to represent the complete digital twin.

• Formal languages for model properties
  Developing languages capable of expressing model properties, how they were verified, and how these properties can be composed to assess the behavior and quality of the complete digital twin.

• Correct-by-construction digital twin engineering
  Designing formal frameworks enabling the systematic construction of digital twins through refinement and refactoring of existing system engineering models.

Key research challenges include:

• achieving scalability when integrating diverse modeling paradigms covering cybernetic, physical, biological, and human aspects;
• combining verification results obtained through heterogeneous methods, including formal proofs, simulations, and machine learning-based models;
• defining refinement strategies enabling correct-by-construction development, rather than relying solely on post-hoc verification.

The research will be use-case driven. Modeling paradigms will first be combined incrementally (e.g., two by two) to design effective integration strategies before scaling up to more complex multi-paradigm digital twin models.

Key Responsibilities

• Conduct research on formal engineering methods for digital twin development
• Design formal frameworks for multi-paradigm model composition
• Develop languages and tools for specifying and composing model properties
• Investigate correct-by-construction methods for digital twin engineering
• Implement prototypes and evaluate them on representative use cases
• Publish research results in international conferences and journals
• Participate in collaborative research activities within the EDT program

Research Environment

The PhD will be conducted at IRIT (Institut de Recherche en Informatique de Toulouse) within the Reliable Software & Systems department.

The candidate will work with several research teams including ACADIE, ARGOS, ICS, and SM@RT, which have extensive experience in formal methods, modeling languages, and dependable systems engineering.

The research will benefit from long-standing collaborations with industrial partners in safety-critical transportation systems, including aerospace and railway domains.

Facilities and Resources

• Expertise in formal methods and model-based engineering
• Existing modeling and verification frameworks developed in previous research projects
• Industrial case studies from transportation and cyber-physical systems
• Collaboration opportunities within the national EDT program

Qualifications

Required

• Master’s degree in Computer Science, Software Engineering, or related field
• Strong background in formal methods, modeling languages, or system engineering
• Programming experience (Java, Python, or similar)
• Interest in cyber-physical systems and digital twin technologies
• Strong analytical and problem-solving skills
• Good communication skills in English

Preferred

• Knowledge of model-driven engineering or domain-specific languages
• Experience with formal verification methods (e.g., model checking, theorem proving)
• Familiarity with cyber-physical systems modeling
• Interest in software language engineering

Application Process

Please submit the following documents:

1. Cover Letter describing your motivation and research interests
2. Curriculum Vitae
3. Academic Transcripts
4. Short Research Statement (1–2 pages)
5. Contact information for two academic references

Funding and Benefits

• Duration: 3 years
• Salary: Competitive PhD stipend according to French standards
• Benefits: Social security, health coverage, research travel support
• Travel: Support for conference attendance and research collaborations

Contact Information

Main spervisor: Supervisor: Marc Pantel
Institution: Université de Toulouse
Email: Marc.Pantel@toulouse-inp.fr

Co-supervisor: Supervisor: Rabea Ameur Boulifa Institution: Telecom Paris
Email: rabea.ameur-boulifa@telecom-paris.fr

For scientific questions regarding the PhD topic, please contact the main supervisor directly.

About the EDT Program

The Engineering Digital Twins (EDT) program is a major French research initiative bringing together leading research institutions to advance the science and engineering of digital twin technologies. The program aims to develop new scientific foundations, engineering methods, and software platforms for next-generation digital twins.